Pesto pasta salad with homemade kale-basil walnut pesto, sun-dried tomatoes, and broccoli. Serve it up at your next BBQ or picnic!
Last summer, my favorite side dish for BBQ-ing or picnic-ing was potato salad in all forms, even – insert gasp – the traditional potato salad with mayo and egg.
For whatever reason, a crazed tunnel vision took hold – I was hooked on po’ and couldn’t seem to fathom sharing anything else with my friends and family.
This year, the obsession has morphed and manifested itself in the form of chilled gluten-free pasta salads.
Fresh.
Simple.
Healthful.
Flavor-filled.
Pasta Salads.
A few weeks ago (back when the dirty banana event happened…do you remember?), one of my friends whipped up a pasta salad with homemade dandelion green pesto using dandelion greens straight from her CSA box.
The flavor was so fresh and tasty, I just couldn’t stop thinking about it.
I had to make it my own.
Using her pasta salad as inspiration, I made a simple kale pesto, tossed in sun-dried tomatoes for extra tangy flavor, and steamed broccoli for nutrients + texture.
If you have basil on hand, feel free to make this with homemade Basil Pesto Sauce instead of the kale pesto!
There are options galore for serving this pasta salad at your BBQs. Below are some tips for recipe preparation and also suggestions for change-ups to the recipe.
Recipe Tips & Meal Prep:
- The pasta noodles and broccoli can be cooked ahead of time, and the kale pesto sauce can be prepared up to 3 to 4 days in advance
- You can steam the broccoli separate from the noodles, but I find it’s easiest to just cook the two together. They require roughly the same cook time, so boiling and straining the noodles and broccoli together will save you some time. If you like your broccoli to be super snappy/al dente, you can cook it for only a couple of minutes with the pasta, and use a slotted spoon to pull it out of the water early.
- In addition to making this recipe a cold pasta salad, it can be served warm as a side dish or entrée as well. To make a hot entrée out of this, simply heat everything together on the stovetop. You can serve the pasta with chopped grilled chicken, or salmon on the side for a well-rounded meal.
Recipe Adaptations:
- Make this pasta salad vegan by omitting the asiago cheese from the pesto sauce recipe. You can add 3 tablespoons of nutritional yeast to give it a “cheesy” flavor.
- Incorporate your favorite nut/seed combo in the kale pesto sauce. My recipe calls for walnuts and pine nuts, but you can use all pine nuts, all walnuts, pistachios, almonds, etc.
- Use any shape of gluten-free pasta (or regular pasta) you’d like.
- Omit or replace the broccoli with spinach, arugula, or seasonal veggie of choice.
- Replace the sun-dried tomatoes with cherry tomatoes.
- Use any type of pesto sauce – store-bought works great!
- Add artichoke hearts and kalamata olives for a Greek-style pasta salad
- Incorporate pine nuts, pistachios, and/or chopped walnuts or almonds.
- Add chopped grilled chicken or cooked bacon.
You can use this recipe as base camp for all your summer pesto pasta salads, as well as hot pesto pasta any time of year. The simple addition of seasonal veggies gives it a fresh spin.
More Amazing Summer Side Dishes:
- German-Style Potato Salad with Caramelized Onions and Chives
- Pasta Salad with Lemon Poppy Seed Dressing
- Ricotta Pesto Potato Salad
- German-Style Sweet Potato Salad
- Roasted Sweet Potato Salad with Spinach and Grapes
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If you make this Kale Pesto Pasta, please feel free to share a photo and tag me at @The.Roasted.Root on Instagram!
Kale Pesto Pasta Salad with Sun-Dried Tomatoes and Broccoli
Ingredients
- 1 12-ounce box gluten-free penne pasta
- 1 medium crown broccoli chopped into florets
- 1 cup kale pesto sauce recipe below
- 1 bunch green onion chopped
- ½ cup sun-dried tomatoes in oil drained and patted dry
- ½ teaspoon sea salt
- Parmesan cheese for serving
Instructions
Prepare the Kale Pesto Sauce:
- Prepare the kale pesto sauce by adding all of the ingredients except for the olive oil to a food processor. Pulse a few times to roughly chop all of the ingredients. Leaving the food processor on, drizzle the olive oil slowly through the top, until it’s completely incorporated. Transfer pesto sauce to a jar and refrigerate until ready to use (Note: Pesto can be made up to 4 days in advance)
Prepare the Pasta Salad:
- Bring a full pot of water to a boil and add the pasta and broccoli florets. Cook according to the instructions on the package of pasta (Note: I usually cook gluten-free pasta for 1 to 2 minutes less than the package specifies, because I like my pasta very al dente), or until both pasta and broccoli reach desired doneness. Strain the pasta and broccoli and rinse with lukewarm water. Set aside to cool. Once cool, chop the broccoli florets finely and place both pasta and broccoli in a large serving bowl.
- Add the green onion, sun-dried tomatoes, and sea salt to the serving bowl along with 1 cup of the kale pesto (save remaining kale pesto for future uses). Toss everything together until pasta is well coated.
- Taste for flavor and add more sea salt or pesto to taste. Serve with freshly grated asiago cheese.
Notes
Nutrition
This was amazing! The pesto was…spicier, I suppose is the right word? Than I’d expected. Maybe it was all the basil. I had to stop myself from eating two servings of this and save some for my roommate. I will definitely be making this again (and adding more sundried tomatoes, I really love those, I’m finding).
I’m thrilled to hear it, Corina!! xo
Looks awesome! have all the ingredients, can’t wait to make this. And WHERE DID YOU GET YOUR TOP??!!
So cute!!
Looks like a great recipe for any time of the year. I can’t wait to try it out, thanks!
What can I use instead of walnuts?
Hi Rose,
You can use any nut, really! Pine nuts, almonds, or pistachios would be my top three recommendations for replacement. Let me know how it turns out!
@Julia, do they have to be raw nuts? Or can you use regular walnuts?
I’m not sure what you mean by regular walnuts…non-roasted walnuts are raw, but either raw or roasted will work 😀 You can use what you have on-hand. xoxoxo
This is making my mouth water! I am loving everything in here…especially that kale pesto…LOVE!
I’m loving summer salads right now, and kale pesto, too! 😉 I’d like to make a big batch of this to enjoy for lunches all week long!
I am such a huge sucker for anything with pesto at the moment! This pasta sounds fantastic! I love that you used sun-dried tomatoes! I could also see myself downing this bad boy for lunch!
I’m also a huge pan of the po’ but if I had to choose I’m thinking this pesto pasta salad would most definitely win. It looks so fresh and so clean, clean! Also, this dandelion pesto you speak of…I’m so intrigued!!