Instant Pot Pasta Salad is made with rotini pasta and filled with fresh vegetables, cheese, pepperoni and Italian dressing to make a perfect summer salad in a flash.
Pasta salad is a fantastic side dish that is easy to make and incredibly delicious. It’s the salad you find on just about every table during the summer because everyone loves the contrast of fresh veggies, spicy pepperoni, and zesty Italian dressing.
This recipe is made even easier by cooking the pasta in an Instant Pot. The instant pot cooks the pasta in record time, so you can have a delicious pasta salad in less than 20 minutes! A quick and simple dinner recipe is possible!
» If you love this pasta salad you should check out these 16 Instant Pot Pasta Recipes to Try.
Ingredients You Need
- Rotini Pasta: feel free to use another type of pasta, but pasta shapes with nooks work best to capture the flavorful dressing in every bite. Tri-color pasta is a fun addition if you can find it.
- Cucumber: It has a refreshing taste and nice crunch – perfect for a summer salad. I use Japanese cucumbers or remove the watery seeds to keep the salad from getting soggy.
- Bell Pepper: Any color of bell pepper works. It adds a beautiful color to the salad and a bright taste.
- Cherry Tomatoes: The best thing about cherry tomatoes is the burst of flavor and slight crunch that regular tomatoes don’t really have. They also keep the water level low so the salad doesn’t get soggy like it will if you use chopped tomatoes instead.
- Red Onion: Gives a subtle spice to the pasta salad. White or yellow onions can be used as well.
- Black Olives: Adds a salty umami flavor to the pasta salad, but feel free to skip it if you don’t like olives.
- Pepperoni: It’s a bit spicy and gives the salad a nice meaty flavor. You can use other types of meat as well like ham or bacon.
- Fresh Mozzarella Cheese: Use fresh mozzarella balls, if you can find them.
- Italian Dressing: It’s tangy with a hint of sweetness. You can buy it in a jar, mix it fresh from a packet of seasoning, or even make your own from scratch.
Helpful Tips
- Instant pot pasta salad tastes good the day of, but it tastes even better the next day as the flavors have time to marinade together.
- Don’t use fresh pasta in this recipe, dried works best. Short pastas like bowtie pasta are also preferable to long pastas like linguini.
- It’s better to add the dressing while the pasta is warm, because it will have an easier time soaking up the dressing’s flavors.
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Instant Pot Pasta Salad
Note: Made in a 6-qt Instant Pot
Equipment
Ingredients
- 6 ounces rotini pasta
- 1 cup water
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 cucumber chopped
- 1 small bell pepper chopped
- 15 cherry tomatoes quartered
- 1/2 red onion diced
- 1 small can black olives sliced
- 1/2 cup pepperoni slices cut into quartered
- 15 mini balls fresh mozzarella cheese
- 1/2 cup Italian dressing
Instructions
- Combine the pasta, water, and salt in the Instant Pot. Lock the lid on and set the vent to sealing. Press the pressure cook button and set to cook for 3 minutes on high.
- When done, allow for a 3 minute natural pressure release before doing a manual release of remaining pressure.
- Meanwhile, chop all the veggies and put them in a large mixing bowl.
- When the pasta is done, drain it and rinse under cold water until the pasta is no longer warm. Add pasta to the mixing bowl. Stir to combine all ingredients. Pour the dressing over the top and stir well. Refrigerate until ready to serve.
Nutrition
Substitutions & Variations
- Vegetarian or Vegan: skip the pepperoni to make the pasta salad vegetarian-friendly. For a vegan pasta salad, don’t use pepperoni and mozzarella, and make sure to buy a vegan-friendly Italian dressing.
- Dressing: most dressings work in this recipe, so experiment and see what you enjoy.
- Spicy: mix in some crushed red pepper flakes, or mix your dressing of choice with a bit of hot sauce. Either one will add a nice kick to the pasta salad.
- International: instead of olives and mozzarella, add in some beans and corn for a Mexican pasta salad.
- Sweet: add some sweetness to the pasta salad with raisins or dried cranberries.
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Laura is a passionate home cook and the owner of A Pressure Cooker Kitchen. She is dedicated to helping people create delicious Instant Pot meals with ease. Laura is an expert at developing recipes that can be prepared quickly and easily using a pressure cooker.