There isn’t a pasta salad out there that can match the refreshment or the brightness of Asian Pasta Salad. The dressing alone is a showstopper, a savory and sweet soy sauce mixture with notes of butter and nuttiness from the sesame. But what it covers goes well beyond what you’d expect to find in a pasta salad: sweet and juicy mangoes, creamy avocados, crunchy red cabbage, and sharp green onions. Elbow macaroni ties everything together into a flavor parcel you can’t wait to unwrap. Asian Pasta Salad shows that a little fusion in your cooking can really up the fun!
Ingredients
For the dressing:
- 2 tablespoons soy sauce
- 2 teaspoons sesame oil
- 1 1/2 teaspoons sugar, plus more to taste
- 1/2 teaspoon sesame seeds
For the salad:
- 8 ounces elbow pasta
- 1 California avocado, halved, seeded, peeled, and diced
- 1 mango, peeled and diced
- 1 carrot, peeled and grated
- 1/4 cup red cabbage, shredded
- 1 green onion, thinly sliced
- 2 tablespoons pine nuts
- kosher salt, to taste
- freshly ground black pepper, to taste
Directions
Step 1 –Whisk together the soy sauce, the sesame oil, the sugar, and the sesame seeds.
Step 2 –In a large pot of boiling salted water, cook the pasta to al dente according to the package directions.
Step 3 –Drain the pasta well and allow it to cool slightly.
Step 4 –In a large bowl, combine the pasta, the avocado, the mango, the carrot, the cabbage, the green onion, the pine nuts, the soy sauce dressing, the salt, and the pepper together.
Step 5 –Serve immediately.
