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Summer is a great time to make all kinds of wonderful, cool salads…is it not? Click here to see all of my salad recipes in one spot. I’ve brought a great new salad recipe to share with you today and add to the growing list in my archives. This Italian Tortellini Pasta Salad is loaded with fresh veggies, artichoke hearts, 2 kinds of cheese and Italian dressing. It would be wonderful to take to a potluck dinner, backyard bbq, or even served as a light dinner. I made a bowl of it while we were at the lake last week, and we loved it.
Hope you have a chance to give it a try! 
1. Grab 1 (1 1/2 pound) package of fresh tortellini. I bought mine at Costco, they come 2 to a package. I used one package and put the other in the freezer for another time. Cook the pasta according to package instructions. Drain in a colander in your sink and pour cold water over the pasta until it has cooled down. Pour it into a large salad bowl.
2. Drain 1 (6 ounce) can medium pitted olives and 1 (12 ounce) jar of marinated artichoke hearts. Place the olives in the salad bowl. Chop the artichokes into 1 inch pieces and add them to the salad bowl as well.
3. Chop 1 small zucchini, 3 small tomatoes and 1/2 a small red onion into 1-2 inch pieces and add them to the bowl. I like to keep the veggies in larger chunks for this salad.
4. Except for these matchstick carrots, which already come conveniently and wonderfully chopped into pretty little sticks. Love. Do you know how long it would take a person to chop carrots that small and evenly? About 5 lifetimes. Add half of a (10 ounce) bag to your salad bowl and feel happy that someone stocked these bags of carrots on the shelf of your local grocery store, won’t you?
5. Chop 5 sticks of string cheese into cubes and add them to the bowl. Toss in 1/2 C grated parmesan cheese and give everything a nice stir to combine.
6. Pour 1/2 C of Zesty Italian Dressing (I used light) over the salad and stir it well. Cover and refrigerate for 1-2 hours.
7. Just before you are ready to serve, add 1/2 C more dressing. Give it a taste and add more dressing to your liking.
Serve and enjoy!
Here’s the handy printable…
Ingredients
Instructions
love the cut and colours, makes a very attractive dish, excellent photography well done.
Very interesting as they used to say on the show Laugh In! LOL I think my mom would like to make this to take to a knitting class where everyone brings something. They would enjoy this. I also like your photography and all the colors.