Tex-Mex Pasta Salad
This Tex-Mex pasta salad is my husband’s favourite summer side dish hands down! Prep and cook time will vary depending on what ingredients you use and how much time you want to spend putting it together. If you want to use dried beans rather than canned be sure to soak and cook your beans before starting. You can use leftover cooked chicken rather than starting with fresh raw; I like to smoke the chicken which adds an hour or two to the prep time, but it adds so much flavour! Despite having shell pasta pictured I don’t recommend it, I usually go for Bowties (I ran out), but you can definitely play with your pasta shapes. I found the shells stuck together a lot in this more cream based sauce.
Modifiers and substitutions will be at the bottom like always for anyone that needs to make adjustments. Possibilities include: dairy-free, vegan, and low FODMAP.
Tex-Mex Pasta Salad
Great for summer BBQ's and potlucks, this Tex-Mex Pasta Salad is a party sized recipe made to feed a crowd. There is a lot of room for imagination and creativity with this. It is bright, fresh, acidic, creamy, smokey and everything you love in a big bowl. You can easily cut the ingredients in half for a family sized portion, but this makes great leftovers for lunches and meal prep.
- 500 grams Bowtie Pasta
- 12 oz Canned Corn (Drained)
- 19 oz Canned Black Beans (Drained and rinsed)
- 1 lb Chicken Thighs (Diced)
- 1 tbsp Taco Spice
- 1 tbsp Tomato Paste
- ¼ cup Water
- 3 Avocados (Diced)
- 1 cup Cherry Tomatoes (Cut into 1/4's)
- ¾ cup Sour Cream (Or plain Greek yogurt for more protein)
- 2 tbsp butter
- 100 grams Shredded Cheese
- ¾ cup Salsa (Divided)
- 1 tbsp Salt
- 1 tbsp Lime juice
- 1 tbsp Hot Sauce (To taste, depending on brand)
- ¼ cup Fresh Cilantro
In a large pot cook your pasta to al dente, strain the pasta water and mix in 1/4 cup of the salsa. This will help prevent the pasta from sticking together and get the spicy tomato flavour to soak in. Set aside.
In a large skillet melt 2 tbsp of butter and sauté the chicken thighs. Try not to move the meat around the pan a lot, you want to develop a deep brown sear on the edges.
Once mostly cooked sprinkle the taco spice over, add tomato paste and 1/4 cup of water, mix thoroughly and allow spice sauce to thicken a bit.
In a very large bowl, start with the cooked pasta in the bottom and add the cooked chicken. Mix until evenly distributed.
Add the drained can of corn, can of beans, diced avocado, quartered cherry tomatoes, sour cream, remaining 1/2 cup salsa, shredded cheese, salt, lime juice, and hot sauce. Mix thoroughly but gently, don't break up the pasta.
Taste test! You can add more salsa, sour cream, salt, hot sauce, lime or lemon juice, cheese, you name it.
When ready to serve top with the fresh chopped cilantro. This can be served with lime wedges, extra hot sauce or sour cream if desired.
Modifiers and Substitutions
Protein
Chicken – You can easily swap out chicken for extra firm tofu, remember to press and drain as much liquid as possible. I would lightly marinade in a mix of vegetable stock and soy sauce to add depth and flavour (approx. 3 tbsp vegetable stock + 1 tbsp soy sauce). There is some great prepared Tex-Mex seasoned tofu available that I will crumble and mix in. Or swap in mushrooms if you’re avoiding soy, oyster mushrooms or portobellos work great and are readily available.
General – Play with flavour! Chorizo sausage, flank steak, ground beef, venison, non-meat alternative, you name it! Changing out your type of protein can make a big impact to the final taste of this dish.
FODMAP
Omit the garlic powder in the Taco spice mix and sauté your protein in garlic oil instead.
Dairy-Free
Sour Cream – Of course there are dairy-free sour creams available depending on your local store assortment. I like buying multipurpose ingredients and I don’t use sour cream in a lot of other meals. So I have played with this one a bit and found two good alternatives that work. First, you can substitute the same measurement in plain non-dairy yogurt, both almond and oat have worked great for me, but it does feel a little light compared to sour cream. Second, you can combine 1/2 cup of non-dairy yogurt with 1/4 cup of mayonnaise. This gives it more richness and fattiness that you would get from sour cream.
Cheese – There are so many non-dairy cheese alternatives available, pick your favourite and go for it!
Vegan
The above notes are your guide, a non-meat protein (Tex-Mex tofu does wonders here). A non-dairy sour cream substitute, go with a vegan mayo if you like the yogurt and mayo option. And your vegan cheese, you’re good to go! This will still come together beautifully, and unless you are cooking for a vegan crowd I would recommend downsizing the recipe to save your cost. Vegan ingredients aren’t cheap, save your wallet and keep those goodies to yourself!
Cauldon Corner
A look through the magical qualities of the ingredients in Tex-Mex Pasta Salad!
- Wheat (Pasta):
- Chicken: Nurturing, fertility, health, healing
- Corn: Fertility, longevity, prosperity, spirituality, protection
- Black Beans: Wisdom, divination, creativity, communication, prosperity, protection, banishing, overcoming obstacles
- Tomato: Luck, protection, health, love, romance, wellness, ward off negativity, money
- Avocado: Lust, love, beauty
- Dairy (Sour Cream, Cheese): Positivity, joy, health, accomplishments, higher energies, inspiration
- Lime: Cleansing, protection, healing, love
- Onion: Promises, oaths, protection, banishing, warding, spirituality, energy, psychic powers, male fertility
- Paprika: Boost energy, strength
- Salt: Protection, purification, barrier, shield
- Garlic Powder: Strengths, courage, endurance, protection, health, inspiration, male fertility
- Pepper/Cayenne: Protection, purification, cleansing, banishing. Also antiseptic
- Cilantro/Coriander: Persuasion, prosperity, protection, peace, self-expression, creativity, cleansing