Summer Entertaining: Garden Pasta Salad Recipe

During the summertime, we occasionally like to invite friends and family over for a BBQ. My husband is very serious about his BBQ, so I let him handle the meat and sauces and I focus on the salads. Thanks to Target, I have some great new kitchen entertaining items that I absolutely love. At the beginning of the seasons, I always love going to Target to check out the new styles and colors that they feature. I love the new bold colors for summertime and that the melamine dishes and tumblers are both made so that you can easily take them from inside to outside without having to worry about breaking them.

I love making garden pasta salad for our summer get-togethers. Please enjoy the recipe below!

Ingredients

• 1 package tri-color spiral pasta
• 1/4 cup chopped olives
• 1/4 cup chopped onions
• 2 tomatoes, diced
• 1/2 cup cucumber, diced
• 1 Bottle of Italian dressing

Directions

Step 1:  Boil pasta until it is done, drain.

Step 2:  Add Italian dressing and toss.

Step 3:  Toss in all of the diced vegetables.

Step 4:  Put in refrigerator for several hours to cool.

This dish is best prepared either the night before or the morning of your dinner. It takes about 15 minutes to make and serves between 8-10 people.

My absolute favorite piece that I received has been the serving bowl with bamboo lid and the bamboo utensils. Since the lid is bamboo, you can also use it as a cutting board, or even a charger for your plates!

I also usually make a lettuce salad with cucumbers and tomatoes for the people who might not be big pasta eaters.

The lid of this bowl is awesome to cut garnishes, cheese, or salami on for entertaining!

Be sure to check out Target’s summer catalog to see great pieces you can get for summer entertaining, as well as some amazing ideas. You can find the following items that I have featured here for great prices!

• Serving bowl with bamboo lid – $11.99
• Bamboo serving utensils – $7.99
• Strawberry melamine dinnerware plates – $1.99 each
• Strawberry melamine salad plates – $1.79 each
• Strawberry hi ball tumblers – $1.99

You can’t miss the summer section at Target. I love how they always decorate the seasonal areas accordingly with bright photos and fun summer related items that lead you to the summer section.

For additional summer fun, visit he Target Summer-izer app on Facebook to add summer elements to your photos and print them out at your local Target store!

What are some of your favorite summer entertaining ideas?

I wrote this review while participating in a blog tour by Mom Central Consulting on behalf of Target and received products to facilitate my review and thank me for taking the time to participate.

If you enjoyed this post, please consider leaving a comment or subscribing to the RSS feed to have future articles delivered to your feed reader.