Creamy Chicken Pasta Salad

by Sabrina Snyder

Published on Last updated

9 Comments

5 from 4 votes
12 Servings
Prep Time 5 minutes
Cook Time 0 minutes
Refrigerate 2 hours
Total Time 2 hours 5 minutes
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Creamy Chicken Pasta Salad is the ultimate BBQ side. It’s made with tender chicken, easy pasta, and a flavorful mayo dressing.

This simple Side Dish combines two classics, Macaroni Salad and Chicken Salad. They’re already good separately, but putting the two together makes a filling and delicious recipe that you’re sure to be making all spring and summer long.

Sabrina’s Creamy Chicken Pasta Salad

One of the best things about Summer has to be the cookouts. There’s nothing like serving up some hamburgers, chicken, steak and other grilled favorites with plenty of sides. It’s the perfect way to spend a warm afternoon. My Creamy Chicken Pasta Salad is a twist on classic deli salads side that you can add to your BBQ dinner, and it doubles as a great picnic or potluck dish too! No matter where you serve it, it’s sure to be a hit with your guests.

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Dinner, then Dessert

Creamy Chicken Pasta Salad

Creamy Chicken Pasta Salad is the ultimate BBQ side. It’s made with tender chicken, easy pasta, and a flavorful lemon, relish, and mayo dressing.
Yield 12 Servings
Prep Time 5 minutes
Cook Time 0 minutes
Total Time 2 hours 5 minutes
Course Salad
Cuisine American
Author Sabrina Snyder
Prepared pasta salad piled in serving bowl
PrintRate

Ingredients
 

  • 2 cups mayonnaise
  • 1 teaspoon kosher salt
  • 1/4 teaspoon coarse ground black pepper
  • 2 tablespoons lemon juice
  • 2 tablespoons relish , sweet or dill both work
  • 1 pound elbow macaroni , cooked and drained
  • 2 cups cooked chicken breast , chopped
  • 4 stalks celery , chopped

Instructions

  • Mix mayonnaise, salt, pepper, lemon juice, and relish.
  • Toss with pasta, celery, and chicken.
  • Refrigerate for at least 2 hours.

Nutrition

Calories: 273kcal | Carbohydrates: 33g | Protein: 12g | Fat: 10g | Saturated Fat: 2g | Cholesterol: 26mg | Sodium: 529mg | Potassium: 190mg | Fiber: 1g | Sugar: 3g | Vitamin A: 91IU | Vitamin C: 1mg | Calcium: 19mg | Iron: 1mg

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Table of contents

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Chef’s Note

This pasta salad keeps fairly well in the fridge so if you have leftovers you can enjoy them as a lunch in the days to follow. Sometimes I make a big batch exactly for that. With the kids home for the summer, things get hectic and I don’t always have time to be making everyone lunch. It’s nice to have an easy dish to pull out of the fridge and serve up without extra work. To make meal prep easier, I’ll cook a large amount of Slow Cooker Chicken Breasts and use some for a big batch of pasta salad and the rest for dinner that night.

How to Store

  • Serve: This salad is best kept chilled, and you don’t want to leave it at room temperature for more than 2 hours.
  • Store: Kept covered or in an airtight container, the leftovers should stay good in the fridge for 3-5 days.
  • Freeze: Unfortunately, the mayo dressing won’t freeze well and I don’t recommend freezing leftovers.

Variations

  • Protein: You can easily replace the chicken in this recipe with cooked turkey, ham, or tuna. Or if you want to make a vegetarian pasta salad, mix in some chickpeas or tofu.
  • Pasta: You can also easily exchange the pasta for whatever you have in your pantry. Instead of using elbow macaroni noodles try rotini, orzo, orecchiette, or any other shortcut pasta you have on hand.
  • Flavor additions: To change up the flavor try experimenting with different ingredients in the dressing. You could add in some spices like oregano, basil, thyme, coriander, or chili powder. Another option is chopping up some veggies to toss in like green onions, bell peppers, cucumbers, or lettuce.
  • Yogurt: To make a healthier dressing, you can exchange half of the mayonnaise for Greek yogurt. It will slightly alter the taste, but the other dressing flavors are strong enough to shine through, and it will keep a similar creamy texture.
  • Cheese: Shredded cheddar, Swiss, provolone, or Jack would taste great with this recipe if you want to add some cheese.

More Delicious Pasta Salads with Chicken

Collage of preparing salad and mixed salad in bowl

The following photos were used in a previous version of this post:

Pasta Salad ingredients in mixing bowl
Prepared chicken and pasta salad in bowl

 

About the Author: Sabrina Snyder

Sabrina is a professionally trained Private Chef of over 10 years with ServSafe Manager certification in food safety. She creates all the recipes here on Dinner, then Dessert, fueled in no small part by her love for bacon.

Sabrina Snyder is a professionally trained personal and private chef of over 10 years who is the creator and developer of all the recipes on Dinner, then Dessert.

She is also the author of the cookbook Dinner, then Dessert – Satisfying Meals Using Only 3, 5 or 7 Ingredients, published by Harper Collins.

She started Dinner, then Dessert as a business in her office as a lunch service for her coworkers who admired her lunches before going to culinary school and becoming a full time personal chef and private chef.

As a personal chef Sabrina would cook for families one day a week and cook their entire week of dinners. All grocery shopping, cooking and cleaning was done along with instructions on reheating. As a private chef she cooked for private parties and cooked in family homes in the evenings for families on a nightly basis after working as a personal chef during the day.

Sabrina has been certified as a ServSafe Manager since 2007 and was a longstanding member of the USPCA Personal Chef Association including being on the board of the Washington DC Chapter of Chefs in the US Personal Chef Association when they won Chapter of the year.

As a member of the community of food website creators Sabrina Snyder has spoken at many conferences regarding her experiences as a food writer including the Indulge Food Conference, Everything Food Conference, Haven Food Conference and IACP Annual Food Professionals Conference.

Sabrina lives with her family in sunny California.

See more posts by Sabrina

Dinner, then Dessert, Inc. owns the copyright on all images and text and does not allow for its original recipes and pictures to be reproduced anywhere other than at this site unless authorization is given. Read my disclosure and copyright policy. This post may contain affiliate links.

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Comments

  2. Hi I’m from Australia so we don’t have a wide variety of sauces like other countries so what kind of relish do you mean , tomato, pickle cucumber, onion
    It would be a great help , thank you

    Reply

  3. I have tried many of your recipes. With 3 kids I forget sometimes to post a review! Love that your recipes are easy, not alot of ingredients and simple instructions. just like ‘This is NOT Diet food’. Thank you for making easy and FAST recipes to put on the table for VERY hungry gentlemen.

    Reply

  4. Quick easy recipe and the family loved it. Will be making again during cookouts. This one is for the recipe book!

    Reply

  5. Delish!!! My husband does not like any salad with Mayo. I only did 1/2 Mayo and 1/2 sour cream plus fresh chiles to give it a kick. He loved it. Had seconds and thirds!

    Reply