Bright and fresh Italian summer pasta salad perfect for picnics, pot lucks and lunchboxes! Super easy to make and just as delicious warm or cold.

This summer pasta salad is such an easy but totally satisfying to eat total crowd pleaser.  Make ahead for a few lunches for the week for yourself or share with friends and family at your next BBQ or picnic!  It’s got such a fresh, savoury and slightly sweet combination of flavours, I promise everyone will love it!

I’ve recently noticed that I use a LOT of Mediterranean flavours and this vegan salad truly showcases many of them.

Pasta salad ingredients:

Sweetcorn – use fresh corn, leftover corn on the cob, canned corn or even frozen corn.

Red onion – I love the slightly sweeter flavour of red onions.

Tomatoes – cherry or grape tomatoes sliced in half make an easy addition to this salad, but any chopped tomato will work. If you’ve got them, garden-fresh ones are always best!

Vegan feta – often called ‘salad cheese’ or ‘Greek white cheese’.  I know it’s been a while since I ate it but I can’t tell the difference between vegan and non-vegan feta!  It’s one of my favourite cheeses, salty, tangy and creamy.

Vegan parmesan – I’ve mentioned this LOADS of times before, but the Violife prosociano wedge is as close to actual parmesan I’ve found.  Looks, smells, grates and tastes like actual Parmesan.

Cashew nuts – toasted until lightly golden they add a delicious crunch to this easy pasta salad.

Pasta salad dressing – the base of the dressing is a simple mix of olive oil, lemon juice and fresh basil.  I wanted to keep this pasta salad as light and fresh as possible and this dressing totally complements the rest of the Mediterranean flavours.

How to make this easy vegan salad:

Start with cooking the pasta.  Bring a large pan of salted water to the boil then cook the pasta according to package instructions.

While the pasta is cooking put the oil, lemon juice, salt and pepper, halved cherry tomatoes, diced red onion, basil, feta and parmesan into a large bowl and mix together.

Lightly toast the cashew nuts in a dry frying pan until just golden.  Keep an eye on them as they can go from almost done to oh crap that’s £5,345,598 worth of cashews buggered and in the bin.  Toss the pan every so often then when done turn off the heat and set aside.

For the last minute or two of the pasta cooking time, add the sweetcorn.  Then drain the pasta and sweetcorn and add to the bowl with the rest of the ingredients, stirring well.

Transfer to bowls, scatter with the toasted cashews and serve immediately while it’s still warm, or leave to cool completely and store in an airtight container in the fridge.

How simple was that?  Don’t underestimate just how tasty this is because it’s so simple.  The fresh basil and veggies and the salty, creamy cheeses do something wonderful when they’re all brought together!

A lovely accompaniment would be this bright, fresh and super summery Strawberry Salsa from The Wimpy Vegetarian.

Looking for even more vegan pasta recipes?  Try these:

Creamy lemon courgette rigatoni

Roast cauliflower vegan pesto pasta

Creamy black garlic and tomato tagliatelle

Lemon and herb orzo with roasted tomatoes

If you make this recipe or any of the recipes from The Cook & Him I’d LOVE to see! Just snap a picture and share it on Instagram using #thecookandhim and tagging @thecookandhim in the photo itself (as this guarantees I’ll see your picture!)

Don’t forget to follow me on Facebook or Pinterest for even more recipe inspiration and chat, competitions, behind the scenes and so much more!