Shrimp and Pea Orzo Pasta Salad

Pasta Salads are one of my favorite sides to eat in the Summer time.  The word salad can be very vague in my opinion and I’ve seen some rather unhealthy ones.  On Wednesday, look out for my very unhealthy salad  and I guarantee you are going to like it. First, we should probably figure out what the term salad really is. According to dictionary.com the term salad refers to “a cold dish of various mixtures of raw or cooked vegetables, usually seasoned with oil, vinegar, or other dressing and sometimes accompanied by meat, fish, or other ingredients.”

Pasta salads definitely have a mix of proteins and vegetables in them with that list of other ingredients.  You can make them your own by adding in whatever you like. For my pasta salad, I went with one of my favorite pastas which is orzo. Orzo, also risoni, is a form of short-cut pasta, shaped like a large grain of rice.  For veggies you have peas and onions and the protein of choice is shrimp. The dressing is a simple mixture of mayonnaise (reduced fat) , lemon juice, and dill for some flavor.

Now, we had this pasta salad at the lake on the 4th of July, and the type of pasta they used was a ring pasta. No dill or lemon juice was used either and that really pumped up the flavor in this dish. The salad was good, but it was lacking flavor and I thought by adding that lemon juice and dill in, that made it even better! You can serve this warm or cold. It tastes better warm in my opinion. Oh and look, there’s a vegetable in this salad. Two to be exact. Did you think that this girl doesn’t ever eat any vegetables? Yes, I do. 🙂