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American Recipes

The Perfect Picnic Pasta Salad – Food Wishes



No matter what pasta shape you use, or which ingredients you add, as far as I’m concerned there’s only one proper technique for building what we’re modestly calling the “Perfect Picnic Pasta Salad.” Enjoy!

For the fully formatted, printable, written recipe, follow this link: https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/284614/the-perfect-picnic-pasta-salad/

To become a Member of Food Wishes, and read Chef John’s in-depth article about Perfect Picnic Pasta Salad, follow this link: https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/284614/the-perfect-picnic-pasta-salad/

You can also find more of Chef John’s content on Allrecipes: http://allrecipes.com/recipes/16791/everyday-cooking/special-collections/web-show-recipes/food-wishes/

47 Comments

  1. Tigre's mom

    I used organic apple cider vinegar. It's pretty stinky. Is it suppose to be? Did I ruin it by using organic?

  3. Pi Murdock

    I don’t like mustard. But I know that I’ve had some good salad dressings I have a little bit of Dijon in them and they’re pretty good. When chef John says it doesn’t taste like mustard, well it tastes very much like mustard it’s a lot of mustard. Other than that good recipe and I enjoy all of your other recipes are pretty dang good. If I made this again I would use maybe a third of the mustard.

  4. Mary Ann Negenborn

    I added a cup of sliced Italian Castelvetrano olives. Yum! Even without the olives, this is the best pasta salad I've ever had.

  8. Olrik Mortimer

    63 ingredients, hours upon hours of preps, hours of waiting, and "… That's it!!! Enjoyyyyyyyyyyy!!!!!" ;-D

  13. Rhainaweißehexe

    Mmmmm, lots of Vegetables and spices. The dressing sounds excellent, I think I would try Balsamic instead of ACV. Thank you ☺️👍🌟

  17. Lisa West

    I have always wanted to be like Joan Jett!!! At 57, I'm still working it, but I love the process. YOU ROCK CHEF JOHN!!🤘

  18. Jenjay L

    This was very oily even though I decreased the oil by 1/3. I cooked the onions with the veggies since they take over the flavor. I added chopped seeded cucumbers for extra crunch.

  19. TwoDuckAllDay

    This is a great recipe! An entire pound of dried pasta can really take a whole lot of herbs and vegetables.

    I made this recipe, pretty much to the 't', and found that I could have increased the quantity of herbs in the vinaigrette.

    The mixture of cooked and raw vegetables is excellent.

  20. Joseph Danyanovitch

    Everyone loved it. I did take some liberties with the recipe but that’s just me cooking! I was little concerned about the acidity of the dressing so I A) added a little honey to the mix and was pretty generous with the pasta water while tossing. Squeezed some lemon juice as it was going on the table. Carrots were the only blanched (1 minute) vegetable, and before the pasta was cooked. The broccoli (cut into very small florets) and thawed sweet peas were just tossed with the host pasta and dressing. Aside from that, I kept to the script. PROS: This Pasta salad will win praise at any event. CONS: The supermarket cost on all these fresh herbs can add up and your left with a lot of unused So its probably a good idea to plan some meals around this influx of fresh herbs.

  21. John

    "For those of you who have turned off this video because you don't like mustard…….Hilarious!! Chef John speaks to those no longer present. This guy is funnier than most of the professional comedians.

  33. Southside Carly

    So glad I watched this because I’ve been wanting to make a pasta salad ( even though it’s not Summer) Thanks for sharing the video

  37. Chris H.

    The trick with adding half your dressing to the pasta while it is still hot is a f***ing game changer! It gets absorbed by the starchy pasta and flavors it just perfectly. I like to add garlic to my dressing which I grated and pressed into a smooth paste with the broad side of the knife and it makes the pasta taste so delicious I have to be careful not to eat all of it while it still cools down. It is near damn perfect. So Chef John, thanks a thousand for this little but all so important trick. Oh, and by the way, the resulting pasta salad is just plain addictive. So much so that I am making a pasta salad (varying the ingredients) on a weekly basis now. It is amazing!

  40. John Pontaoe

    I was listening to a baseball game on ye olde radio so it drowned out the sound of this video, but I counted Chef John digging in 7 times into the finished product, that's more than any other recipe I've seen. I do like those full curl noodles, hope they don't entangle during cooking

  41. Edenandtruth

    I am doing this salad right now, in fact, I just put it in the refrigerator. I can hardly wait! Thankyou

  42. Kevin Cook

    This method is just opposite of what you did to make macaroni salad. Apparently the pasta doesn't need to be cool dry and tacky.

  44. Michael

    Babish VERSUS Chef John:

    Who is right about the consistency to cook pasta for salad? Babish says to “ever so slightly undercook” while Chef John says to “cook it until tender.”

    When it comes to pasta salad, these two food giants need YOUR help to determine the victor! Vote now on your phones.

  45. Sahej

    I’m a no mustard person ! I don’t like the mustard flavor in my dressing ! I’ve read flax seeds are good emulsifiers

  47. ytugtbk

    One of your stranger episodes. This is certainly not a traditional cold pasta salad. Who would think to put peas, broccoli, and carrots in such a salad. Also, think you set the record for a) most ingredients used in a dish, and b) most stir-to-cover events during cool-down.

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