The Best Pasta Salad Recipes — The Cooler at the Lake, the Saturday Picnic

Another week. Another set of sunrises over Lake Superior. Another set of meals cooked for one and eaten at a table set for two. The two-place setting is the thing the kids have stopped commenting on. They used to remark when they came to visit. They used to gently suggest, in the way grown children gently suggest, that perhaps it was time to set just one. Now they set their own additional plates around mine and they let Paul's plate be Paul's plate. The setting is the love. The setting is the staying. Elsa called from Voyageurs. She had a sighting of a wolf — a single gray adult crossing a frozen bay at dawn, fifty yards from her cabin. She had a sighting of a moose two days later. She is happy in the woods. I am glad someone in this family is happy in the woods. I have always loved Lake Superior, but the deeper woods are not for me. Elsa is for the deeper woods. The match is right. Anna sent photos from Minneapolis — the kids in their school uniforms, David's new bookshelf, the dog (their dog, not mine; their dog is named Cooper, and Cooper is a Bernese mountain dog who weighs more than Anna and who is, by all accounts, the most relaxed dog in the upper Midwest). I printed three of the photos and put them on the fridge. The fridge holds the family that is not currently in the kitchen. I cooked Picnic cold cuts this week. Smoked ham, summer sausage, sharp cheddar, gherkins, mustard, rye bread. The cooler at the lake. The Saturday picnic. Thursday: soup. Always soup. Gerald said, "You are the most reliable woman in Duluth." I said, "I am the most reliable woman in this kitchen." He said, "Same thing." I do not think that is the same thing. I think that is a kindness Gerald gives me because Gerald is kind. I take the kindness. I do not argue. I lit a candle in the kitchen for no particular reason. Maybe for Mamma. Maybe for Pappa. Maybe for Lars. Maybe for Paul. Maybe for all of them. The candle is a tall white tapered one, set in a brass holder Mamma had on her dining room table for forty years. I let it burn down. The dripping wax made a small white pool on the brass. I cleaned it off. I lit another one the next night. It is enough. Paul is not here. Mamma is not here. Pappa is not here. Erik is not here. They are all here in the kitchen, in the smell, in the taste, in the wooden spoon and the bread pans and the marble slab. The dead are not where the body went. The dead are in the kitchen. I have learned, slowly, that there is a kind of competence that comes only with age. Not wisdom, exactly — wisdom is a word too grand for what I mean. Competence. The competence of having watched many things go wrong and many things go right and having developed an internal database of which is which. The competence is, perhaps, the only thing that improves with age in a body that is otherwise declining. I will take the trade. It is enough.

The cold cuts have always been the Saturday meal — the cooler packed, the rye bread wrapped in wax paper, the gherkins rattling in their jar. This pasta salad carries all of those same flavors: the smoked ham, the sharp cheddar, the snap of a gherkin, the clean bite of mustard. It is the kind of dish that holds together in the cold, that tastes better the second day, that you can set on a table for two and not feel the absence — only the presence of everything that was ever good about an afternoon at the lake.

The Best Pasta Salad

Prep Time: 20 min | Cook Time: 10 min | Total Time: 30 min (plus 1 hr chilling) | Servings: 8

Ingredients

• 12 oz rotini pasta
• 6 oz smoked ham, diced into 1/2-inch cubes
• 6 oz sharp cheddar cheese, cubed
• 1/2 cup dill gherkins, sliced into coins
• 1 cup cherry tomatoes, halved
• 1/3 cup red onion, finely diced
• 1/3 cup black olives, sliced
• 1/4 cup fresh flat-leaf parsley, chopped
• 2/3 cup mayonnaise
• 3 tablespoons Dijon mustard
• 2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1 teaspoon celery salt
• 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
• Salt to taste

Instructions

1. Cook the pasta. Bring a large pot of well-salted water to a boil. Cook rotini according to package directions until al dente, about 8–9 minutes. Drain, rinse under cold water to stop cooking, and let cool completely.
2. Make the dressing. In a small bowl, whisk together the mayonnaise, Dijon mustard, apple cider vinegar, olive oil, celery salt, and black pepper until smooth. Taste and adjust salt as needed.
3. Combine the salad. In a large mixing bowl, combine the cooled pasta, ham, cheddar, gherkins, cherry tomatoes, red onion, olives, and parsley. Pour the dressing over the top and toss until everything is evenly coated.
4. Chill before serving. Cover the bowl and refrigerate for at least 1 hour before serving. The flavors deepen as it sits. This salad keeps well covered in the refrigerator for up to 3 days — it is, if anything, better the next afternoon.
5. Serve cold. Taste once more before serving and adjust seasoning. Serve straight from the bowl alongside rye bread and extra gherkins if you like.

Nutrition (per serving)

Calories: 390 | Protein: 16g | Fat: 22g | Carbs: 33g | Fiber: 2g | Sodium: 780mg