Tomato Pesto Pasta Salad (Easy Cold Side Dish)

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In ~20 minutes, you can have an Italian style tomato pesto pasta salad ready to eat. It’s an easy cold side dish for a potluck or party. And a simple recipe for a weeknight. Enjoy it as a make ahead salad for steak dinners or pizza nights. Let’s nom!

What started as a recipe to use up tomatoes has turned into a popular cold side dish for steak dinners and pizza nights at my house. My husband also thinks this tomato pesto pasta salad is the perfect 9pm snack. You know, since it’s easy to get hungry again at night when you eat dinner at 5pm with a toddler.

Featured in this recipe is Prosecco vinegar by Colavita and a gorgeous Acadia wood cutting board from Viking Culinary. Thanks so much to Colavita and Viking for supporting my creative pasta salad recipes and partnering with me to bring this one to you.

Ingredients for this Italian style pasta salad

The source of all the Italian flavor in this dish is centered around that combination of pesto and champagne vinegar dressing. Making pasta salad with ready-made pesto is a genius way to save on time.

Here are all the ingredients you need:

Rigatoni pasta (the grooves hold the sauce)
Pesto sauce
Champagne vinegar
Veggies: carrot, tomatoes, red onion
For the Italian pasta salad topping: Parmesan cheese, basil, pepper

Just a quick note about making dressing for pasta salad with pesto and vinegar.

The pesto can be ready-made pesto from the store. And you can use a range of light vinegars for this recipe. White wine, champagne, or specifically the one used in this recipe video for tomato pesto pasta salad.

How to make tomato pesto pasta salad

Step 1. Boil water on medium-high and cook pasta according to directions until al dente. While pasta is cooking, prepare the dressing.

Rigatoni pasta is the perfect shape for the pesto in this pasta salad to cling on to.

Step 2. Make the pesto pasta salad dressing by whisking the pesto and champagne vinegar together in a bowl. Set aside.

Step 3. When pasta is done cooking, add pasta and vegetables to a large bowl.

Add pesto pasta salad dressing and mix together.

Top with freshly grated parmesan cheese, basil, and a fresh crack of pepper.

Store in the refrigerator for 2-3 days.

This recipe takes a basic pasta salad up a notch with Italian flavors. That final touch of basil and freshly grated parmesan cheese is a must.

We love having this type of easy cold side dish ready for snacking in the fridge. Usually, I’ll make a big batch and we’ll have it with a main dish like Caprese chicken sandwiches, or a sous vide whole chicken, or sous vide T bone steak.

It’s one of the best simple cold side dishes for pizza night, too. It’s the perfect Sunday dinner when served with my homemade pizza using store bought dough.

How I avoid an onion cry fest

My personal secret to avoiding crying like my childhood dog just passed away every time I cut an onion? Wearing contacts! I swear by it. If I’m in the kitchen, wearing glasses, I’ll go put in my contacts so I can survive meal prep in the kitchen.

Especially when I have a big batch of red wine caramelized onions or pasta salads like this one or my famous tortellini salad.

Kitchen tools + ingredients to help

These bowls are so convenient.

In the recipe video for this Italian pasta salad, you’ll hear me go off on having a million bowls of leftovers in the fridge. I absolutely hate when there are a ton of little dishes and bowls and they’re toppling out of the fridge whenever I open it to grab some milk for my toddler or iced tea for myself.

That’s why the large bowls used in this recipe are my favorite. They are so many things in one:

Mixing bowls to make the salad
Serving bowls that look great on the table
Storage bowls that stack nicely in the fridge (they come with lids!)

These bowls come in a set of 3. I originally bought them when I went live on-air at KGW Portland’s morning show. I needed an easy way to transport and share my Caprese salad and Mexican vegetable salad with the anchors at 5 am. These bowls are so perfect!

Shop these bowls here.

This really is a versatile side dish for a number of occasions. It’s a cold side dish for a potluck or party. Or serve it with a weeknight meal. And enjoy leftovers for a work from home lunch.

Digging this pesto with champagne vinegar by Colavita

Special thanks to my friends at Colavita for supporting my many pasta salad recipe creations with their vinegars. Shop Prosecco vinegar by Colavita.

Loving these boards for make ahead meal prep

Thanks again to Viking Range for the gorgeous Acadia wood cutting board featured in this recipe.

Make ahead pasta salads are so convenient

When I lived in the downtown Pearl District of Portland, I was always walking by Whole Foods and other grocery stores where I could pick up deli-style macaroni salad on the fly.

Now that I’m living the new parent life in the ‘burbs, I like to keep the fridge stocked with these deli salad recipes. They are so great to make and eat seasonally. This type of summer pesto pasta salad is perfect to use up tomatoes from the garden and farmers market.

Other dishes currently in our make ahead salad rotation:

Storing tomato pasta salad

The base is an olive oil pasta salad. Since there’s no mayo or other creamy ingredient, it’s important to enjoy this pesto pasta salad within 1-2 days. Seal it in an airtight container.

Help pesto pasta salad taste good for days…

To make a pesto pasta salad like this one taste as good the following days, add a little more dressing of pesto mixed with white wine/champagne/Prosecco vinegar.

This helps because the pasta sits in the fridge and dries out. So if you have leftovers and want them to taste as good as eating this dish the day you make it, add more dressing.

Final tips for tomato pesto pasta salad

Remove the inside of tomatoes and seeds if desired. Usually I roughly chop them and take out the gooey inside if it comes out easily. Otherwise, a little bit of tomato goop and seeds in the salad is fine.
If you don’t have ready made pesto in your fridge, you can also make this basil pesto pasta salad with Italian dressing.
There are so many types of tomatoes to choose from, you really can’t go wrong. Substitute grape tomatoes or cherry tomatoes sliced in half.
This Italian style tomato pesto pasta salad will last in the fridge for up to 3 days. To add freshness to pasta salad that’s been in the fridge for a couple days (since pasta salad can dry out over time), add a little more pesto and champagne vinegar dressing to the pasta salad before serving.

Are you a foodie, too?

Lately I’ve been super obsessed with adding on these basic pasta salads to steak dinners and potlucks with friends. You can see my latest make-ahead salad idea on Instagram @sipbitego.

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