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Buffalo Chicken Pasta Salad

14

  • Prep Time10 min
  • Total Time20 min
  • Makes6 servings
*PLUS overnight cooling time
A bowl of Buffalo Chicken Pasta Salad on a patterned tablecloth for a post on the best easy barbecue side salad recipes

Recipe by Jennifer Pallian. Produced by Sun Ngo. Photography by Christie Vuong. Food Styling by Ashley Denton. Prop Styling by Christine Hanlon.

Toss saucy Buffalo chicken with fresh veggies and a tangy blue-cheese dressing for a spicy-creamy combination that’s hard to beat.

Ingredients

  • 227 g penne pasta

  • 2 cups cooked chicken, shredded or chopped

  • 1/4 cup Buffalo sauce

  • 1 cup cherry tomatoes, diced

  • 1/2 cup diced celery

  • 2 tbsp minced fresh parsley

  • 1/3 cup crumbled blue cheese

Dressing

  • 1/4 cup sour cream

  • 2 tbsp mayonnaise

  • 1 tbsp lemon juice

  • 1 tbsp minced shallot

  • 1 tsp kosher salt

  • 1/4 tsp pepper

Instructions

  • Cook pasta in salted water, following package directions, until al dente. Drain and rinse under cold water. Refrigerate overnight if possible. (See Kitchen tip.)

  • Dressing: Whisk sour cream with mayo, lemon juice, shallot, salt and pepper in a medium bowl. Set aside.

  • Stir chicken with Buffalo sauce in a large bowl until evenly coated. Add pasta, tomatoes, celery and parsley. Drizzle with dressing, then toss to combine. Sprinkle blue cheese overtop.

Kitchen tip Cooling pasta in the fridge overnight allows for more extensive realignment of the starch molecules. It will have a chewier texture and won’t slurp up all the dressing or break from tossing. However, you should still cool the pasta quickly in cold water first to halt the cooking process so that it stays al dente.

Find more pasta salad recipes, plus food scientist Jennifer Pallian's simple trick for perfect pasta salad.

Get more of our best barbecue side salad recipes.

Jennifer Pallian is a food scientist, recipe developer and blogger at Foodess. She lives in Vancouver.

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