Veggie Spiral Salad

  If you have a variety of vegetables this is the salad for you. The Taste of Home Farmers Market Cookbook has several recipes using vegetables, and this salad looked different and I had most of the things called for on hand. 

  I used my homemade Italian Dressing instead of the packaged called for, but either would work fine. Also, I think you could use any vegetable you have on hand (I added shredded carrots). We felt that the red onion was good and the tomato. 

  While Bettie prefers a Mayo based salad, she thought this was good. Maybe because of all the black olives which are a favorite of hers. Lyle liked the dressing. I liked making it early in the morning when it was cooler.  All said, it went quite well for supper on a very hot holiday weekend. 

Veggie Spiral Salad

1 cup uncooked tricolor or plain spiral pasta

½ cup chopped and seeded cucumber (take a spoon and run through to remove the seeds)

½ cup thinly sliced celery

½ cup chopped red onion

½ cup sliced radishes

½ cup chopped tomatoes

½ cup sliced ripe olives, drained

½ cup shredded Swiss cheese (almost any hard cheese will work)

½ teaspoon garlic powder

⅛ teaspoon pepper

Dressing

1 Tablespoon Italian salad dressing mix

2 tablespoons + 1 - ½ teaspoons cider vinegar

2 tablespoons olive oil

  Cook pasta accordint to the package directions. Meanwhile, in a large bowl, combine the vegetables, cheese, garlic powder and pepper. Drain and rinse pasta in cold water; stir into vegetable mixture.

  In a small bowl whisk dressing mix, vinegar and oil. Drizzle over salad and toss to coat. Serve immediately or refrigerate.