Ain't No Pasta-Pasta Salad

 Last week I bought some pasta salad at a local grocery store.  It was gross.  And I know I need to stay away from all things carby....like pasta... so I started thinking about it and came up with this.  All ingredients except the herbs were bought at Aldi's, and I have enough left over for a nice veggie soup.

I've kind of lost my way in the Low Carb World in the last couple of years, and I need to get back to it.  This new recipe should help, and maybe it will spur my creativity on!

Ain't No Pasta-Pasta Salad

Ingredients  

1 med zucchini sliced and halved or quartered

1 med yellow squash sliced and halved or quartered

1 med red onion diced

4 ounces fresh mushrooms capped, and slice the caps (retain the stems for soup!)

4 ounces sliced black olives

1/2 cup diced peppers (I used 1 each of yellow, orange and red sweet mini peppers) seeded and sliced

4ounces hard salami. (I used mini rounds cut in half, but any size is fine if you cut into bite sized pieces) Or you could use pepperoni, or both!

8 ounces of mozzerella balls sliced in half (if you can find the mini balls, use them whole)

4 to 5 ounces cherry tomatoes, or any other small tomatoes, cut into bite sized pieces.

4 to 6 ounces bottle of Italian Dressing or other vinaigarette (I used 3 cheese vinaigarette from Aldi's)

Optional for serving:

1 tablespoon crumbled feta cheese

sprinkling of chives

basil

Steps

Now here is where it gets really complicated.....

1. Mix it all together and stir. Refrigerate over night to marry the flavors.

That's it!

Notes

Serve on a bed of lettuce if desired. You could add any fresh summer veggies you want. Some people like cucumbers in a salad like this, but cuc's and I don't get along very well unless you make a pickle out of them.