Vegan Old-Fashioned Catalina Pasta Salad! Ideal for picnics, potlucks, or a quick weeknight dinner, this vegan pasta salad is a crowd-pleaser that’s both easy to make and irresistibly delicious.
If you’re on the hunt for a vibrant, flavorful pasta salad that’s perfect for spring and summer gatherings, look no further than this Vegan Old-Fashioned Catalina Pasta Salad. Packed with tender pasta and bursting with fresh red bell peppers, crisp green onions, pimento olives, and crunchy celery, this salad is a rainbow of flavors and textures. The star of the show? A deliciously sweet and tangy homemade Catalina dressing that coats every bite, elevating the dish to new heights.
Whole Food Plant Based, Vegan, plant based, oil free, refined sugar free, no highly processed ingredients and gluten free.
Hi there, Ameera here!
Mom went absolutely crazy over this vintage makeover pasta salad — she loves pasta salad, and this one made her Top 10 list of summer favorites! We all devoured it, and those pimento-stuffed green olives? Totally the secret weapon that makes this dish stand out.
Perfect for summer, it’s a timeless recipe that combines classic flavors with a modern, plant-based twist—trust me, your taste buds will thank you!
Tips for Success:
- Flavor Profile: This vintage Vegan Old-Fashioned Catalina Pasta Salad is filled with tender pasta, red bell peppers, green onions, celery, and a combination of sliced and finely chopped pimento olives all coated in a deliciously sweet and tangy homemade Catalina dressing. Perfect for picnics, potlucks, and every day!
- Pasta Salad History: Believe it or not, pasta salads were all the rage starting as far back in the 1920’s in the United States. Pasta salad’s history goes back even farther with roots in both Jewish and Italian culinary traditions. There are many countries that claim the creation of pasta salads all the way back to the 19th century. This old-fashioned vintage Catalina Pink Pasta Salad showed up around the 1920’s in the United States and was both sweet and tangy and was very popular until more traditional pasta salads pushed it out of the way. If you love Catalina dressing, green pimento olives with its mixture of sweet and tanginess along with pasta salad, then this recipe is for you!
- Pimento Olives: We used ½ cup of sliced pimento stuffed green olives and ½ cup chopped pimento stuffed green olives. Feel free to increase or decrease the amount as desired. The pimento olives add a delicious tang and flavor. They really make the dish! Chopping some of the olives allows for great distribution of flavor. The sliced olives showcase a beautiful presentation.
- Pink versus Orange Color: The traditional recipe is called Catalina Pink Pasta Salad. Most store-purchased Catalina Dressings are typically deep red due to the addition of chemical dyes, then when mixed with mayonnaise, hence the name Catalina Pink Pasta Salad. This pasta salad has a pinkish-orange color simply because we are using homemade ingredients and no chemical dyes. It still has a beautiful color and guests are impressed with its creaminess, tanginess, and beauty.
- Regular Chili Powder: Feel free to use your favorite chili powder, just be sure to select a mild one and not one that has a lot of heat to it.
- Sweet Paprika: Sweet paprika is the typical paprika that you find in grocery stores. We just want to make sure you don’t accidentally use smoked paprika. Additionally, check the expiration date on your paprika spice container. Old paprika spice tends to not be as vibrant and flavorful.
- Cashew Substitutions: You can try the typical substitutions like silken tofu, white beans, or other nuts or seeds with the understanding that the flavor and texture will be impacted accordingly. We have not tested any substitutions.
- Oil-Free Pasta Salads: Oil-free Pasta Salads tend to really drink up the dressing simply because oil-based pasta salads use oil to coat the pasta creating a barrier where the oil helps prevent the dressing from being overly absorbed by the pasta. With oil-free pasta salads, the dressing is absorbed into the cooked pasta while in the refrigerator. If presenting for guests, picnics, or potlucks, we suggest not dressing the pasta salad until right before serving.
- The Day Before or Earlier in the Day:
- Cook the pasta, refrigerate.
- Make the Catalina dressing refrigerate.
- Chop, slice, dice each of the Base Ingredients and store individually in the refrigerator.
- Right before Serving:
- Place the cooked and refrigerated pasta in a colander and rinse with cold water. Use your fingers to gently separate the pasta. Continue rinsing until all the pasta is loosened (it tends to stick together). Then drain well to remove any excess water.
- Place all the Base Ingredients into a large bowl, mix well.
- Stir the Catalina Dressing, if too thick add a tablespoon of water (or vinegar) and stir well. Evaluate the thickness, add a little more, if needed.
- Pour the Catalina Dressing over the Base Ingredients, mix thoroughly, then serve in a serving bowl.
- Pure Maple Syrup: Most Catalina dressings are sweet. The sweetness of this dish is totally within your control. Start on the low-end and increase as you feel necessary.
- Various Vinegars: This delicious pasta salad uses 3 different vinegars: rice vinegar, distilled white vinegar, and ume plum vinegar. Each individual vinegar brings a different depth of flavor to this dish to create its unique flavor combination.
- Ume Plum Vinegar: We get a lot of questions on ume plum vinegar. It is fairly inexpensive and adds amazing flavor. You can find it in most health food grocery stores or online. You can leave it out if you can’t find it, adjust your ingredients accordingly. We highly recommend locating ume plum vinegar as it has beautiful flavor. If you are concerned about buying it only for this recipe, no worries, we have quite a few recipes that use ume plum vinegar. Simply type ume plum vinegar in our search bar to locate other amazing recipes using this tasty vinegar.
- Pasta: We used a rotini pasta. Feel free to use your favorite short-cut pasta like elbows, ditalini, small shells, etc.
- Amount of Pasta: We used 10 oz. of dry pasta for this pasta salad. When ready to add the cooked pasta to the salad, start adding the cooked pasta one cup at a time, reviewing the dressing to pasta ratio to achieve the creaminess desired. Use 8 oz. if you enjoy a very creamy pasta salad. Make sure you scape down the Catalina dressing from inside the high-speed blender to get every last bit of that delicious dressing into the pasta salad.
- Gluten Free Pastas in Pasta Salads: If using a gluten free pasta, rinse thoroughly and drain well. Serve immediately. Gluten free pasta tends to seize up in the refrigerator and can become stiff and almost crunchy. We suggest serving immediately after making if using a gluten free pasta for the best results.
- Celery: Celery is optional in this recipe. We had family members who love celery and the extra crunch while others preferred this pasta salad without the celery.
- Celery Seed: Celery seed adds great flavor to this pasta salad; however, if you are not a fan, then leave it out. We have family members who absolutely LOVE it while others HATE it.
- Table Salt: If using table salt, you should use less table salt than the amount listed in the ingredients as sea salt crystals are larger than table salt crystals. Since table salt crystals are very fine, less table salt is required to season a dish. We would suggest starting with about 1/4 to 1/2 the amount of sea salt listed. You can always add more salt but cannot take it away. We recommend using sea salt as it is less refined than table salt.
Leftovers and Freezing:
Leftovers will generally keep 5 days in the refrigerator. Store in a covered container.
This pasta salad does not freeze well.
Pantry Products:
- Ume Plum Vinegar: We used Eden Ume Plum Vinegar. Feel free to use your favorite brand of ume plum vinegar.
- Sea Salt: Please adjust the sea salt based upon your family’s sea salt preferences and/or based upon dietary needs.
Kitchen Equipment:
- Large pot (for boiling pasta)
- High-Speed blender
If you try this tasty pasta salad, we would love to know if you enjoy it as much as we do! Please leave us a review! Post a picture on Facebook or Instagram and tag us! We would love to hear from you.
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Vegan Old-Fashioned Catalina Pasta Salad
- Prep Time: 25 Minutes
- Total Time: 25 Minutes
- Yield: 7 Cups 1x
- Category: Salad
- Diet: Vegan
Description
If you’re on the hunt for a vibrant, flavorful pasta salad that’s perfect for spring and summer gatherings, look no further than this Vegan Old-Fashioned Catalina Pasta Salad.
Ingredients
Salad Ingredients:
- 1 red bell pepper, small dice
- 5 to 6 green onions, sliced (+/-)
- 1 cup pimento olives, sliced/chopped (divided) *
- 2 celery ribs, diced (optional) *
Catalina Dressing Ingredients:
- ½ cup [raw] cashews *
- ½ cup water
- 3 Tablespoons tomato paste
- 1 Tablespoon lemon juice
- ¼ cup rice vinegar
- 1 Tablespoon distilled white vinegar
- 1 Tablespoon ume plum vinegar *
- 3 Tablespoons pure maple syrup (+/-) *
- 2 Tablespoons dried minced onions
- 1 teaspoon onion powder
- 1 teaspoon garlic powder
- 1 ¼ teaspoons sweet paprika (+/-) *
- ¼ teaspoon regular chili powder (+/-) *
- ½ teaspoon dried ground mustard powder (+/-)
- Pinch to 1 teaspoon sea salt (+/-) *
Other Ingredients:
- Pinch celery seeds (optional) *
- 8 to 10 oz. rotini pasta *
Instructions
- Place the cashews in a small bowl, pour boiling water over top and soak for 15 to 20 minutes, then drain (discard water) and set aside.
- Cook the pasta according to package directions, rinse well with cool tap water until cold, shake off excess water, set aside to drain.
- Place all the Catalina Dressing Ingredients (including the soaked and drained cashews) into a high-speed blender, process until smooth and emulsified, set aside.
- Place all the Salad Ingredients and cooked pasta into a large bowl, mix well to combine, then pour the Catalina Dressing over top, sprinkle in the celery seeds (if using), mix well. Serve and enjoy! Refrigerate leftovers.
Notes
*Please reference the blog post for Tips for Success, Pantry Items Used, Storage and Freezing, and Kitchen Products Used.
*Sea Salt: Please adjust the sea salt based upon your family’s sea salt preferences and/or based upon dietary needs.
*Servings: 6 to 8 (makes 7 cups)
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