Pesto Pasta Salad with Peas is a delicious, homemade pasta salad that's super easy and ready in a snap. Pasta, pesto sauce, frozen peas and a sprinkling of Parmesan cheese. That's it. The result is a zesty, aromatic pasta salad that's ready to serve in 20 minutes!
This is a versatile side dish that goes well with any protein, especially chicken or grilled meats. Serve it with Smoked Salmon on a Pellet Grill or Buttermilk Chicken Tenders for a wonderful meal!
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🥗 Ingredients to Have on Hand
Pesto Pasta Salad with Peas is by far one of the easiest recipes to prepare, but the lack of a lengthy ingredient list or long preparation time is no reflection on the flavor factor. Here's all you need:
Pasta: Use three cups of pasta in a variety of shapes, one cup of each shape. This gives the salad a unique texture. It's great to keep a variety of pasta shapes on hand in the pantry for recipes such as Sweet Corn Pasta Salad, Butternut Squash Mac and Cheese and Smoked Gouda Mac and Cheese.
Peas: Regular, frozen peas from the freezer section of the grocery store are perfect. I like to keep frozen peas on hand for my English Pea Salad too!
Pesto Sauce: You can either make fresh pesto at home or buy store-bought pesto.
Parmesan Cheese: This adds a hint of saltiness to the pasta salad and it balances the sweetness of the peas while bringing out the natural nuttiness of pesto.
Scroll to the recipe card below for a full list of ingredients and measurements.
🥣 How to Make Pesto Pasta Salad with Peas
Step 1: Cook 3 cups of pasta in various shapes. Boil in salted water according to the directions on the box, likely at least 10-11 minutes but cook the pasta until it's tender, not chewy. Drain the pasta, rinse lightly with a little cool water from the kitchen faucet and place it in a medium-sized bowl. (Photo above.)
Step 4: Stir the pasta, pesto and peas together. The warm pasta will help defrost the frozen peas. Then add freshly grated Parmesan cheese. (Photo above.)
🍽 How to Serve Pesto Pasta Salad
It's especially convenient to serve Pesto Salad with Peas in the summer as a BBQ side dish, but honestly, it's equally delicious served any time of year with burgers, Cheeseburger Pie with a Flaky Crust, Dutch Oven Chicken, No Ketchup Meatloaf or a pork loin. It's ideal for potlucks or office parties too!
⭐ Pro Tip
This can easily be served as a main dish. Just top each serving with a grilled chicken breast, or cooked fish like Skillet-Glazed Salmon. Delicious!
You can serve Pesto Pasta Salad with Peas warm, at room temperature or chilled. I think It's best served cold, but there's no reason to chill it for hours before serving.
Simply toss the ingredients with the cooked pasta and refrigerate until you are ready to eat. It doesn't matter if that's in 15 minutes or a few hours.
🍲 Pasta Shapes for Pesto Salad
I recommend using at least two, but ideally three different shapes of pasta for this recipe. Those various shapes give the pesto plenty of space to hide and add a lot of eye appeal.
⭐ Pro Tip
Be sure to cook the pasta just past the al dente stage. Boiling it for one or two minutes in addition to the cooking time listed on the pasta box is usually perfect. Cooking time varies depending on the shape of the pasta.
This is one of those rare pasta recipes where you want the pasta to be slightly soft instead of chewy. That way the pasta doesn't get hard or even crunchy after being blended with the other ingredients and cooled.
💭 Recipe FAQs
You sure can, and it may be delicious that way, but I recommend sticking with the peas. Let me know in the comments if you tinker with the ingredients and love the outcome.
Pecorino Romano has a similar taste, but the texture is more crumbly. Aged Asiago is also good, although the flavor is more mild than Parmesan.
👩🏻🍳 The Inspiration
There's a grocery store in Boise, Idaho called the Co-op, it's a community-owned natural foods store (not affiliated with this blog or sponsored) and they sell delicious deli salads, including one called "Four P Salad." This recipe for Pesto Pasta with Peas is my copycat version of their delicious pasta recipe.
🌡️ How to Store Leftovers
Pesto Pasta Salad stays fresh for 2 - 4 days in the refrigerator in an airtight container. Keep it covered. I love to keep a bowl is this on hand because it's so easy to scoop up a serving for a fast lunch.
🥙 More Salad Recipes
Looking for more side salads to share? Here are a few of my favorites!
If you make Pesto Pasta Salad with Peas I'd love to hear how it turned out. Please leave a 🌟 star rating and a comment below. I'm looking forward to hearing from you!
Recipe
Sarah says
Well that looks fresh and delicious. You could pair this with some roast chook from the supermarket for an easy and delicious meal, yum! 🙂
Gabriela Herrera says
Carbs on carbs dont threaten me with a good time. The fact that there are peas and pesto in here is just divine. Great as a dinner before a long run.
Kalin says
Loving all the p’s! It’s hard to not love anything with pasta and Parmesan 😉
Gregory Halpen says
Yum! This is so up my alley! I love this salad. 🙂