pasta, pasta!

Obviously certain foods are always associated with certain times of the year. For me, having pumpkin pie in the middle of the summer would just be weird. Just like hot dogs in November make no sense at all. What I find more odd is that I associate certain foods with certain people.

Take for example the two girls I lived with in college. I will never be able to have carrot cake or tomatoes without thinking of Tamara. The carrot cake because her mom had the best recipe ever and the tomatoes mainly because of her hatred of them and disgust when I would leave half of a tomato out on the counter because I refused to put tomatoes in the frig. Come on though, cold tomatoes are gross.

Same goes for Sarah with couscous and pasta salad. Once, when we were probably 21 or 22, Sarah had to make a pasta salad for some sort of pot luck function. I can't possibly fathom what sort of pot luck this girl was attending. She wasn't exactly the pot luck type, nor were we really living in a pot luck town, but nonetheless, Sarah needed to make pasta salad. I remember it being quite good and at the time none of us were cooking all that often, so it was nice to have the extra food around. (I am just now wondering why I was eating this stuff if she had to take it somewhere. My bad, Sarah.)

Anyway, she bought this special pasta salad seasoning stuff by McCormick. It was just a salad seasoning blend that literally said "great for pasta salads!" on the front. Obviously hours of research went into this.

In the several years and several moves that have transpired since then, I have somehow inherited this seasoning and found it in my kitchen cabinet last weekend. 5 moves, 4 states, and a marriage later, and I still have that stupid salad seasoning. Since I am obviously of the school of thought that seasonings never go bad, and I miss my friends, I decided it was time to make some pasta salad.

This isn't rocket science and you certainly don't need to follow a recipe precisely to make it turn out well, but this is what I did.

1 12 oz box of tri colored rotini

1/2 c. roasted red peppers, diced (I used the kind in the jar. I'm classy like that)

3/4 c. grated asiago cheese

1/2 of a medium cucumber, diced

1/8 c. diced leeks

1 carrot, finely diced

3 tbs. McCormick's salad seasoning (because it's 'great on pasta salad!')

1/2 c. Italian dressing

sea salt and black pepper to taste

Cook the pasta, drain it, then throw everything together in a bowl. It saves well and makes for a great brown bag lunch the next day.

I buy the Italian dressing mixes that you add vinegar and oil and shake. I'm working on my dressings, but they still have a long way to go. Tim always looks a little worried when I announce that I made the dressing -- and I can't say I blame him.