Pasta Salad into Caprese Pasta Salad

Pasta Salad

into

Caprese Pasta Salad

I went to a show last night at the Hollywood Bowl - a picnic friendly venue - with my friend SueAnn and her friend Shane. They made a caprese pasta salad, and thought it was just an awesome summer dinner. Here is my variation on it. I decided to create a new take on the last dressing I made. Rather than use raw garlic to infuse olive oil for days, I decided to cook the garlic into the olive oil, let it cool, then use it as a dressing.

Garlic Infused Olive Oil Vinagrette:
4 cloves of garlic
1/4 cup of olive oil
1 tsp dijon mustard
1/8 cup balsamic vinegar with a splash of red wine vinegar

Pasta Salad:
12 ounce pack organic multi colored rotini pasta
1/2 red onion
1 and 1/2 cups fresh basil. it was about half a big pack
1/2 log (or use a full log) of fresh mozarella
salt and pepper
2 tablespoons of red wine vinegar

Caprese Pasta Salad:
add tomatos
spinach

Boil a stockpot of water. While the water is coming to a boil, heat a pan and mince the garlic. add the olive oil and allow to heat for about less than a minute on low heat. Add the garlic, and cook for less than a minute stirring through the pan and cook evenly. Then remove from heat and allow to cool.

Dice the onion and set aside. Wash and dry the basil. Remove the stems and chop the basil.

Boil the pasta and drain as directed. Put the pasta in a very large bowl. While the pasta is still warm, toss the onion in and stir so the heat from the pasta cooks the onion a bit. Add in two tablespoons of red wine vinegar, and season with salt and pepper. Then add the basil. Allow this to cool before adding cheese.

Now the olive oil should be cool. Pour the garlicky olive oil into a liquid measuring cup. Add vinegar to just short of an 1/8 cup then add a splash red wine vinegar. Add a teaspoon of dijon mustard. Beat thoroughly with a fork.

Dice the fresh mozzarella into bite size pieces. Pour the dressing over the pasta salad and toss.

To make the Caprese Pasta Salad. Take a 1/2 cup or so of spinach and place in the bottom of a bowl. Put a scoop of pasta salad. Top with a couple of diced tomatos.