Summer Pasta Salad

This is a delicious fusilli salad with sugar snap peas and roasted peppers, perfect for an outdoors summer meal.

Ingredients for salad:

8 oz fusilli
2 cups snap peas, strings removed, blanched
4 green onions, including tender green tops, thinly sliced
1 red bell pepper, roasted and cut into ¼ inch strips
1 yellow bell pepper, roasted and cut into ¼ inch strips

Ingredients for dressing:

3 tbsp rice wine vinegar
1 tsp sugar
½ tsp salt
Freshly ground black pepper
1/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil
½ cup loosely packed basis leaves, cut into chiffonade*

Preparation:

Cook pasta according to package directions for al dente. Drain in colander and rinse briefly under running cold water; shake the colander gently to drain completely and set aside.

To make the dressing, in a small bowl combine the vinegar, sugar, salt and pepper to taste. Slowly whisk in the olive oil until an emulsion forms; stir in basil.

Place the pasta in a large serving bowl and add the sugar peas, green onions and pepper strips. (If you are refrigerating the salad, do not add the peas until just before serving. The acid of the dressing will cause them to lose their brilliant green color.) Gently toss. Pour the dressing over the mixture and toss again gently but thoroughly. Serve immediately.

* To cut basil into chiffonade, stack 6 to 8 leaves on top of each other, roll them up in a tube, and cut thinly crosswise across the tube.

Serves 8

Please visit our Olive Oil home page with this link