BLT Pasta Salad with Creamy Pesto Dressing

A beautiful, filling pasta salad with all of the best flavors of a BLT. Hearty enough to be the main dish, this BLT Pasta Salad has it all: crispy bacon, tomatoes, lettuce, plus avocado, croutons, and a delicious creamy pesto dressing.

This isn’t just any pasta salad. It’s not the goopy macaroni salad that you buy at the grocery store and serve alongside brats and burgers as a filler for summer meals.

No, this pasta salad is meal-worthy. It’s the centerpiece of a lovely, breezy, relaxing summer dinner.

Relaxing, because you made this BLT Pasta Salad earlier in the day, and then when supper time rolled around, you pulled the bowl out of the fridge, gave everything a little toss, and DONE. No burgers needed.

Why I love this BLT Pasta Salad (and I hope you will, too!)

There’s something so special and iconic about a BLT sandwich. I don’t even have to describe it because you’re summoning up the flavor memory of it right now, right?

In my pasta salad, plump pasta shells take over the carby roll of bread and broaden the BLT from mere sandwich to a full meal, while losing none of its original charms.

The only thing that’s better than this BLT-inspired pasta salad for dinner is the planned leftovers the next day. I look forward to pulling the bowl out of the fridge and digging right in for lunch. Or yes, even breakfast (it has bacon, after all).

And also, when it’s your turn to bring a side dish for summer cookouts, you will absolutely *wow* the crowd when you uncover a huge bowl of this pasta.

Ingredients, Prep Tips and Substitutions

• Bacon — Of course the star of the show is bacon. I always bake bacon in the oven for both hands-off ease and speedy cleanup. You can also use the air fryer. Skillet frying is a-okay, too. Bacon is expensive these days, so I just use regular bacon, not thick cut. There’s no particular advantage to thick cut in this recipe. Use whatever you prefer! Can you turkey bacon? Absolutely. You can even use veggie bacon. The bacon flavor won’t be quite as pronounced, but there’s no reason not to use it.
• Greens — I love greens in pasta salads. I know that some people don’t so feel free to skip if that’s you. This BLT Pasta Salad is a hearty dish, so I prefer to use spinach — or lately, here in 2024, arugula! — rather than tender green leaf lettuces. They hold their firmness better.
• Tomatoes — My go-to tomatoes are always cherry tomatoes, whether store-bought or picked fresh in my backyard. Cherry tomatoes are sweet and extra tomato-y, and the perfect size to fit on a fork. Do take the time to slice them in halves or quarters, so that you and your guests aren’t stabbing at tomatoes rolling around your plate.
• Avocado — Avocados might not be a traditional ingredient, but I absolutely love them in this pasta salad. Skip them, if you prefer.
• Red onions — Most salads, green or pasta, can use a kick of alliums of some kind to bring out maximum flavor: slivered onions within, green onions sprinkled on top, or some garlic in the dressing. Here, red onions do the trick. If you and yours are sensitive to the taste of raw onions, soak the slivers in some cold water for about 15 minutes, drain, and pat dry. This removes much of the bitter compounds that make us tear up around onions.
• Croutons — In a nod to bread, I add crushed, seasoned croutons to the salad. Whole croutons are a little bit much, but reduced to pea-size as just the right amount of crunch to the pasta, without overwhelming the other ingredients. Tip: Add croutons to a plastic zipper bag and use a rolling pin — or even a can-of-something, like beans — to gently smoosh the croutons into smaller bits.
• Creamy pesto dressing — Pesto is a strong flavor and for a dressing, I like to tame the lovely bite with some creamy dairy. A mayo, a little yogurt, a splash of balsamic create a smooth and luscious dressing with the right amount of basil herbal goodness.
• Pasta — The choice of pasta shape is important here, but there is flexibility. To be blunt, just about any pasta shape that you can stab with a fork will work. I wouldn’t go with noodles or other long shapes. While spaghetti could be interesting, it would be a differently textured dish altogether (sounds intriguing? Try my Cold Spaghetti Salad). I use always shells here, but elbows, rotini, bowties, wheels, or orecchiette would work well, too.

If I might humbly say so, it’s even better than the classic BLT sandwich that inspired it, because it not only hits all of the right flavor notes, it also skips right over the scratchy toast part of the sandwich sitch, replacing those carbs with tender, toothsome pasta.

I hope you enjoy it!

Want even more BLT inspiration? Try my BLT Soup. It’s fabulous, and yes, it absolutely works as a soup!

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BLT Pasta Salad Recipe

A beautiful, filling pasta salad with all of the best flavors of a BLT. Hearty enough to be the main dish, this BLT Pasta Salad has it all: bacon, tomatoes, tender spinach, plus avocado, croutons, and a delicious creamy pesto dressing.

Prep Time20 minutes mins

Cook Time15 minutes mins

Total Time35 minutes mins

Course: Pasta

Cuisine: American

Keyword: blt pasta salad

Servings: 6

Calories: 453kcal

Author: Karen Gibson

Ingredients

Dressing:

• 1/2 cup mayo
• 1/2 cup Greek yogurt
• 1 1/2 tablespoons white balsamic vinegar
• 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
• 2-3 tablespoons prepared basil pesto

Pasta salad:

• 12-14 ounces pound medium pasta shells
• 6 strips cooked , crispy bacon
• 1 pint cherry tomatoes , sliced in half or quarters
• 1/2 red onion , slivered (about 1 cup)
• 1 cup fresh spinach leaves , sliced chiffonade
• 1/2 avocado , peeled and chopped
• 1 cup seasoned croutons , crushed to pea-size
• kosher salt
• black pepper
• fresh basil leaves , minced

Instructions

Make the dressing:

• Whisk together the mayo, Greek yogurt, vinegar, and salt until smooth. Mix in 2 tablespoons of pesto and taste. Add another tablespoon if you’d like a more assertive pesto flavor to shine through. The dressing should be thin enough to drip from a spoon. If necessary, add very small amounts of water, whisking after each addition, until the dressing is pourable. Taste, and add another pinch of salt to taste. Set aside. (Or refrigerate, if you’re making the pasta salad later.)

Make the pasta salad:

• Prepare the pasta according to package directions. Drain, and rinse well under cold water.
• While the pasta cooks (and cools), prepare the remaining ingredients (see notes for tips on cooking bacon).
• Set aside 1 strip of the bacon (store in the fridge); crumble the rest.
• Pour about 1/2 cup of the dressing into a small container, and put in the fridge for later.
• Add the crumbled bacon, tomatoes, onions, spinach, and avocado to a large bowl. Sprinkle a pinch of salt over the vegetables, then drizzle a little bit of the dressing. Toss to coat.
• Add the pasta to the bowl, and gently fold all of the ingredients together to mix. Add the dressing in thirds, folding gently as you go.
• Cover the pasta salad, and refrigerate for at least an hour, to let all of the flavors meld.

To serve:

• Thin the reserved dressing with a small amount of cold water or extra virgin olive oil (your choice). Drizzle the dressing over the pasta and fold gently. (The pasta will have absorbed a lot of dressing during its time in the refrigerator, so, the extra dressing will loosen things up and recoat the salad.)
• Crumble the reserved bacon strip over the salad. Top with the crushed croutons and basil, and serve!

Notes

My favorite way to prepare crispy bacon is to bake it in the oven. See the instructions here.

Nutrition

Calories: 453kcal

Nutritional information, if shown, is provided as a courtesy only, and is not to be taken as medical information or advice. The nutritional values of your preparation of this recipe are impacted by several factors, including, but not limited to, the ingredient brands you use, any substitutions or measurement changes you make, and measuring accuracy.