Chicken Pasta Salad

Not sure why pasta salad came to my mind. I just had to have something else for a change. In fact I've done pretty good in this trip. I've been here for 3 weeks (with another 3 to go), and only been to Chinese restaurant once. In fact, that trip turned out to be just mediocre. There was nothing fantastic about the food. Rice rice and mushu port. I can even do it if I have proper equipment. For some reason, I can cook eggs for breakfast with the electric stove, but Chinese food? No, no way. I need gas stove.

So I don't think I'll go back there. 30 CND is good for lots of grocery anyway. I also do not plan to make any Chinese food here. Maybe something else would be nice. I guess that's when I thought about pasta salad.

I tried to search online for recipe, but all the recipes I found require strange (for me) ingredients. I know they could be just some dry spices available in the grocery stores, but I really did not plan to spend 20 CND just to get ingredients to make a bowl of pasta salad, and know that the ingredients may have to sit in the cupboard for years before they will be used again.

So when Ed said he has a simple recipe that they really enjoy. I asked him to send it to me right away. I love it at the first sight of the ingredient list, because they are all so simple, and I use them pretty much on a daily basis. I followed the recipe quite well, and here it is (direct copy and paste from email):

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12 oz package of tricolor spiral pasta
1.5 cups mayonnaise
1 cup grated Parmensan cheese
.5 cup milk
1 teaspoon salt
2 cooked chicken breasts, skinned, bonned and cut into bite size chunks
1 cup chopped tomato
1 cup chopped green bell pepper
.25 cup coarsely choppen onion ( we use the blue onions they are milder and prettier)

In a larg pot of boiling salted water, cook the pasta to desired doneness; drain, let cool and set aside.
Meanwhile, in a large bowl, combine the mayo, parmasan cheese, milk and salt. Add pasta and toss to blend.
Mix the remaining ingredents , chill for several hours before serving. Easy
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I cooked the whole package of pasta, 375 grams, or around 13 oz. Cooked pasta expanded so much that I could not mix all at one time, so I divided it into 2 batches. The attached photo is from the first batch. A bit more mayo in it, but the flavor from mayo is still not offensive. I used Kraft Miracle Whip to replace mayo, and it is not very strong in flavor anyway. For the second batch, I used 2/3 of required mayo, and the salad tasted like heaven.

Chicken adds a very nice texture to the salad. I really enjoyed it. I did not use bell pepper, as it is harder to digest, however, I may wanna add some celery or avocado next time, for more color and more flavor.

I made them for lunch one day, and we finished all of the pasta salad the next day for supper. That's how great this recipe is.