Roasted Broccolini Zucchini Pasta Salad

Why You’ll Love This Recipe

It has lots of roasted vegetables. When I make a pasta salad, I always try to have enough other ingredients, so I end up with more than noodles in each forkful. That keeps things more interesting. I also like the balance of pasta and vegetables to be more even.

A great pasta salad has a mix of flavors and textures. For this recipe, I toss everything in lemon vinaigrette, which gives the salad nice brightness and acidity. Also, the vegetables have a variety of soft, crunchy and crisp bites with the broccolini stems and crowns and the sliced zucchini.

Pasta salads are fantastic for potlucks, holidays, cookouts and so much more. That’s why you should have a few go-to recipes to cover all these occasions and lunch or dinner on any day of the week. They are great for vegetarians as a main dish.

The Ingredients

This is what you need:

• Broccolini is pretty easy to find at the grocery. Even though it isn’t technically baby broccoli, you sometimes see it labeled that way. For this recipe, I trim off the bottom end, and then roughly chop it from stem to crown. I love the variety of pieces you get when you prep it this way.
• Zucchini should have deep green skin with a slight sheen to it. Avoid any that have soft spots or are limp. Fresh zucchini should feel firm.
• Pasta: Fusilli or rotini are great because their corkscrews really hold on to the bits of fresh herbs, feta and broccolini tops. You can substitute with other short shapes such as penne or orecchiette.
• Feta has this wonderful salty, briny flavor. Those crumbles end up mixed throughout the salad. Goat cheese is the closest substitute. For more mild cheese options, try torn fresh mozzarella or grated parmesan cheese.
• Walnuts add their crunch. You can enhance their nutty taste if you toast them first. Whenever I buy walnuts, I chop them and spread them out on a sheet pan and toast them in a 350-degree F oven for 5-7 minutes. Then you don’t have to do this every time you add nuts to a recipe. You can substitute with almonds.
• Scallions have a light green onion flavor. If you want something bolder, swap scallions for 1/4 cup finely chopped red onions.
• Parsley and chives give the pasta salad something fresh and herby.
• Lemon vinaigrette: The dressing has minced garlic, whole grain mustard, lemon juice, salt, pepper and olive oil. Use extra-virgin olive oil for the best taste.
• Olive oil, salt and pepper: As mentioned, these are ingredients in the vinaigrette, and you also toss the vegetables in them for roasting.

How To Make This Roasted Broccolini Zucchini Pasta Salad

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.

1. Toss the broccolini and zucchini with olive oil, salt and pepper. You can do this right on a baking sheet. Spread out the veggies across the pan in a single layer. They shouldn’t be overlapping.

2. Roast the vegetables until the broccolini is crisp on the edges and the zucchini is lightly browned. They will roast in 20-25 minutes.

3. Cook the pasta while the broccolini and zucchini roast. Bring a pot of salted water to a boil and simmer the fusilli until it is al dente according to package instructions. Drain the pasta in a colander and rinse with cold water.

4. Make the vinaigrette. Whisk the garlic, mustard, salt, pepper, lemon juice and oil in a small bowl.

5. Combine the pasta, roasted broccolini and zucchini, scallions, parsley, chives, feta and walnuts in a big bowl.

6. Drizzle the vinaigrette into the salad, tossing everything together. Taste the pasta salad and season with more salt and pepper if you think it needs it.

Serving

As mentioned, you can serve this zucchini pasta salad as a main dish or a side dish. It all depends on what else you have going on with the meal. The flavors of roasted vegetables and lemon are incredibly versatile and play well with all sorts of other spring and summer recipes such as baked corn zucchini fritters. 

I like serving this salad with a grilled entree too. It can be helpful to split your cooking for a single meal. Not everything has to go on the grill. When you use both the grill and the oven, it can make multitasking much easier. Grilled main dish ideas include tofu veggie skewers and grilled halloumi with vegetables.

Leftovers & Storage

You can save leftovers in an airtight container the refrigerator up to 2 days. The longer you keep the salad, the more the pasta will soften losing some of that al dente bite that it had when you first cooked it. That is also the same for the roasted broccolini and zucchini. Give leftovers 15 minutes to sit out at room temperature before serving.