Dorothy Kern
This pizza salad is a delicious tortellini salad full of pizza flavor with pepperoni, bell peppers, olives, tomatoes, and homemade balsamic dressing! It’s great for weeknight meals, potlucks, picnics, and summer BBQS.
Tortellini salad is my favorite pasta salad – and this is my favorite version!
I love this tortellini pasta salad because, hello, it’s all about the pizza flavors but served up cold and light. I can seriously eat a whole batch of this myself – it’s so good!
I’m all about the pasta salads these days and I love that you can do so many variations. I’ve had taco, Greek, Italian and so many other versions and this pizza tortellini salad I’m sharing is one of my favorites. I mean, it’s a pasta salad with pepperoni… what could be better than that?
You Will Love this Pizza Salad Recipe!
This easy pasta salad recipe is loaded with black olives, green peppers, pepperoni, Parmesan cheese and the most delicious homemade balsamic dressing to pull it all together. Basically, it’s an Italian pasta salad with a pepperoni pizza twist. This is the side dish to make for all the potlucks and BBQs, but it’s also great for weeknight dinners. You’re gonna love it!
Table of Contents
Ingredients for EASY Tortellini Salad
The only thing you have to cook are the tortellini and the rest of the recipe is just a toss and serve situation. Here’s what you need to make it:
- Cheese tortellini
- Diced green bell pepper
- Halved grape tomatoes
- Halved pepperoni slices
- Sliced black olives
- Shredded Parmesan cheese
- Balsamic dressing
For the dressing, you can use my favorite homemade version (I’ve listed it out in the recipe card) or buy your favorite store-bought brand. Making your own is really easy – I highly recommend it.
Just combine balsamic vinegar, Dijon mustard, shallot, garlic, olive oil, Italian seasoning, salt and pepper in a jar with a fitted lid (like a mason jar). Shake until the dressing emulsifies and is well combined.
Now, many of you know I hate mustard. To me, mustard is the absolute devil. I will not touch it. Making my husband a sandwich makes me sick. BUT…in this dressing, it’s actually good. There’s so much balsamic and other flavors you don’t even taste the mustard (and I know, because in 99% of dressing recipes I can sure taste it if it’s there). I love adding it because it helps the recipe emulsify (as in, blend together).
My dressing recipe makes more than you’ll need and the extra will keep well in the refrigerator for up to two weeks.
Once you have all the ingredients it’s as easy as tossing everything together in a large bowl with the dressing. Serve the salad at room temperature or pop it in the fridge to serve later.
More Recipe Tips and Tricks!
Pizza pasta salad will keep for two days in the refrigerator, so you can make it in advance. Sometimes it might be a little dry because the pasta will absorb some of the dressing while it sits. It’s an easy fix, though! Just toss the salad with a little extra dressing and it will be good to go.
You can serve this salad at room temperature or chilled – the choice is yours! Since it doesn’t have any mayonnaise in it you don’t have to worry to much if it sits out for a while.
You can easily customize it, too! Instead of a pepperoni salad you can use salami, add cubed cheese like provolone or mozzarella or switch out the green bell pepper for sweet peppers.
The combination of the cheese tortellini with all the Italian-style ingredients is definitely a winner! With the lightness of the dressing and the flavors of pepperoni, olive, pepper, tomato and cheesy pasta, this pizza tortellini salad tastes JUST like you’re eating a slice of pizza. It’s the perfect potluck dish and you’ll want to make it all summer long!
Other summer salad recipes
If you love pasta salad, be sure to try Taco Pasta Salad by Wine & Glue, Greek Pasta Salad by Noble Pig, or Cowboy Pasta Salad by Bellyfull.
Have you made this recipe?
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Pizza Tortellini Salad
Ingredients
Salad:
- 1 about 19 ounce bag Cheese Tortellini cooked according to package directions
- 1 green pepper diced
- 1 cup halved grape tomatoes
- 1 cup Pepperoni slices halved
- 1 can 8 ounces sliced black olives, drained
- 1/2 cup shredded parmesan
- Balsamic Dressing recipe follows, or use your favorite brand
Dressing:
- 1/2 cup balsamic vinegar
- 1 tablespoon dijon or spicy brown mustard
- 1 tablespoon diced shallot
- 1 garlic clove crushed
- 2/3 cup olive oil
- 1/2 teaspoon Italian seasoning
- 1/2 teaspoon salt or to taste
- 1/4 teaspoon ground pepper or to taste
Instructions
- Stir together cooked tortellini, pepper, tomatoes, pepperoni, olives, and shredded parmesan in a large serving bowl.
- To make dressing: add all ingredients to a mason jar or dressing container. Seal and shake well to combine.
- Dress the salad with desired amount of dressing. There will be dressing left over; store in refrigerator for up to 1 week.
- Pasta salad is good prepared for up to 2 days; store tightly covered in refrigerator.
Nutrition Information
Nutritional information not guaranteed to be accurate
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My Pizza Salad is a tortellini pasta salad with pizza toppings! Fill this with bell peppers and pepperoni, olives and parmesan and top with balsamic dressing. This is an easy pasta salad recipe, perfect for summer.
All text and images © DOROTHY KERN for Crazy for Crust. Please do not use my images without prior permission. If you want to republish this recipe, please re-write the recipe in your own words, or link back to this post for the recipe. Disclaimer: Nutrition information shown is not guaranteed to be accurate.
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Published on: July 1, 2020
What a great idea. I will definitely make this
I’ve made this several times now and loved it, as well as the people I’ve made it for! Definitely a keeper, and will be great to have on hand for potlucks since it’s not mayo based. I stuck to the recipe exactly the first time and it came out perfect. And the dressing makes way more than is needed so I keep it for salads later in the week. Second time I used grated instead of shredded parm, and it wasn’t as good so keep to grated!
I’m going to try this with some caramelized onions and mozarella pearls stirred in!
I just made this tonight and it was fantastic! Will make it again for sure 🙂
How many does this serve?
Wow this looks amazing!
The pizza tortellini needs mushrooms, and I would use pizza sauce. It looks good I will try this recipe both ways yours first then my way. Thank you for sharing
The nickname for tortellini came from Nana! The hole in the middle probably had something to do with it. lol
I can see how this would be a huge party/potluck/picnic kind of crowd favorite! I didn’t know you were that passionate about black olives although I did know you aren’t a mustard fan. I love hearing your food do’s and don’ts 🙂 And I didn’t know Mel was low/no carb!