With a full stack of delicious and nutritious salad recipes, we approach the end of the salads sharing era, and we are about to enter a different era:Sunday Small Bites. For our next "project", we decided to change it up a bit, the assigned person will be choosing an ingredient of the week, rather than a recipe, and everyone in the group will be making an appetizer using that chosen ingredient. The catch is, we are all going to try to use the ingredient in a recipe that we have not tried before. I am really looking forward to that, I think it will be a little more challenging, but the reward will be a huge number of appetizer recipes right in time for the holiday parties.
Before we get carried away from salads though, there is one last delicious salad recipe that Ida(Vico Girl) from SlowTravel shared with us. And boy I am glad she did, it is a wonderful salad, with delicious Mediterranean flavors. Here is what Ida says about her recipe:
I've been making this for years and it's especially good for a buffet/party as it serves quite a few. Now... I've never really measured the exact amount of the ingredients I use, but I tried for ST so here goes:
1 lb or a little bit more Fresh or frozen tortellini or a Barilla bag of dry tortellini
Boil as per package instructions and set aside.Don't overboil them! COOL them down a bit. (I used fresh tricolored).
In a very very large bowl mix together:
1 container of pearl or small sized fresh mozzarella balls ( I buy mine from Sam's Club or BJ's)
16 oz jar of Julienne cut Calif sundried tomatoes in oil ( I use 3/4 of the jar)plus the oil! Just pour the oil into the bowl.
4 cloves garlic chopped superfine
1 large bunch Italian parsley chopped fine
1 jar black dried olives in oil pitted and sliced ( this takes a while)
16 oz jar (or larger from costco) Marinated Artichokes cut into pieces ( i think mine was 24oz)
1 jar marinated red peppers cut in strips if you want ( I stopped adding them)
S/P and some extra virgin olive oil
Now that you've mixed the above ingredients well Add cooked tortellini a few scoops at a time mixing well. Cover bowl with glad wrap and refrigerate overnite as it taste even better the following day after the flavors blend together. Serve at room temp! I served mine with grilled shrimp.
I cheated a bit with this salad by buying a Mediterranean mix from the health food store. The mix already had pitted kalamata olives, mushrooms, sun dried tomatoes, and capers marinated in olive oil. To that mixture I added a container of small Mozzarella balls, a jar of marinated red peppers, some garlic, parsley, salt, pepper and a bit of lemon juice. I used tri-colored cheese tortellini, and the salad was heavenly. I could not resist having a small bowl the night I made it, and it was yummy, but Ida is right, it was even more delicious the day after.This might be the last salad for Sunday Salad Samplers, but it is definitely a winner! Thanks Ida for sharing your delicious tortellini recipe.
I would also like to thank all the Sunday Salad Samplers for expanding my salad recipes horizon, and sharing all eighteen wonderful salad recipes, some of which I may have never tried on my own. You are all great inspiring cooks:)
Comments (3)
Hi Candi, your salad looks really delicious. That was a great idea using a salad bar mix for some of your ingredients. I tried to find something similar but couldn't. I did find marinated artichokes at the salad bar though which I got instead of the ones in the jar. I'm glad that I did, because it was very good. I agree with you that this was a very tasty salad and I also loved it.
Have a great Sunday evening!
Posted by Kathy (Trekcapri) | August 23, 2009 6:07 PM
Posted on August 23, 2009 18:07
Good job, Candi - your salad looks delicious!
Looking forward to the Small Bites series!
Posted by nancyhol | August 23, 2009 9:15 PM
Posted on August 23, 2009 21:15
I love your idea about getting ingredients from the olive bar! I'm doing that next time.
I have really enjoyed all our salads.
Posted by Annie | August 24, 2009 7:26 AM
Posted on August 24, 2009 07:26