Rainbow Veggie Salad

Here we are this week with my first savory dish since April. Apparently vegetables are good for you, so I figured I'd take a break from sweet things and try my hand at a summer potluck staple - pasta salad.

This recipe comes from the Luther Memorial Home 50th Anniversary Cookbook and is credited to M. Hlavinka.

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Rainbow Veggie Salad

Salad

1 1/2 cup rainbow or plain rotini pasta, cooked and drained

2 cups cooked ham, cubed

1 cup carrots, thinly sliced

1/2 cup radish, thinly sliced

1/4 cup green onions, sliced

1 large cucumber, halved and sliced

1 tbsp. fresh parsley, chopped or 1 tsp. dry parsley

Dressing

1 cup mayonnaise

1 tbsp. sugar

2 tbsp. lemon juice

Salt and pepper to taste

Mix all ingredients in a large bowl. Chill.

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This recipe calls for rotini specifically, but you can obviously use whatever short pasta you prefer. As you see in the photos, I opted to use pasta shaped like the state of Texas. Even if you visit this state for only one day, it's very evident that nobody loves Texas as much as Texas loves Texas. Therefore products in the shape of the state are numerous and easy to find. And can you blame them? I don't know about you, but it's definitely in my top ten state shapes.

As far as the flavor of this pasta salad, I enjoyed it. The ham I bought was not great quality and brought it down a little, so that's something to keep in mind if you make this yourself. I also felt like maybe the ham ratio was a bit high, so I might cut it down a bit in the future. The vegetable combination is nice and I felt like I was eating something moderately healthy in comparison to the butter and sugar-filled standards I typically post about (though it does have a bunch of mayo in it). If you plan to try out this recipe and are a Miracle Whip person, I would suggest leaving out the sugar in the dressing since it's already pretty sweet compared to mayo.

Final Rating: 4/5 pretty darn good as far as pasta salads go