Mexican Chicken Southwest Pasta Salad Recipe

White bowl on marble counter filled with Mexican Chicken Southwest Pasta Salad with a Creamy Avocado dressing.

Mexican Chicken Southwest Pasta Salad Recipe

Pasta and tacos, a delicious combination. Chicken, corn, beans, chili, and cheese are combined with pasta noodles, then topped with a creamy avocado sauce.

Course Main Dishes, Side Dishes

Cuisine American, Mexican

Keyword pasta salad, Southwest Pasta Salad

Prep Time 15

Cook Time 10

Total Time 25

Servings

Calories 465kcal

Author Michele @ Flavor Mosaic

Ingredients

Creamy Avocado Dressing

2 avocados diced
½ cup Mexican crema or sour cream
⅓ cup mayonnaise
3 limes juiced
1 (1-ounce package) spicy ranch seasoning or any flavor

Pasta Salad

1 pound rotini cooked according to package directions
1 (15.5-ounce can) corn drained
1 (15.5-ounce can) black beans drained and rinsed
1 (17-ounce can) chopped green chilis
1 (6.5-ounce can) black olives
1 cup cherry tomatoes halved
1 green pepper diced
⅓ cup cilantro chopped
⅓ cup red onion diced
1 cup Mexican shredded cheese

Instructions

Creamy Avocado Dressing

In a mixing bowl, combine all the dressing ingredients and stir to combine. It is fine if some of the avocados get a little mashed but make sure there are plenty of big pieces as well.

Pasta Salad

In a large serving bowl combine all the pasta ingredients and gently stir together.
Pour the dressing over the pasta and stir to combine.
Either serve immediately or cover and refrigerate until ready to serve.

Video

Notes

Flavorful Tip: For an even more flavorful pasta salad, make it a couple of hours or a day in advance to give the flavors some time to more fully develop and blend together.

Time-Saving Tip: Make it easy on yourself and make the pasta in the Instant Pot. Set the pressure cook time for half the time it says to boil the pasta. That means if the directions on the pasta box say to boil the pasta for 10 minutes, then pressure cook for 5 minutes.

Chicken Tip: Use up leftover cooked chicken in this pasta salad. That means you can use Rotisserie chicken, or my Rotisserie Chicken Tenders, or from one of my other recipes, such as Skillet Chicken Fajitas, Easy Instant Pot Chicken Thighs, or Oven Baked Chicken Breasts in this recipe.

Freezing Pasta Salad: If you want to freeze pasta salad, it is best to freeze the pasta separately from other ingredients in order to maintain the texture of the pasta salad as much as possible. If you have leftover prepared pasta salad and want to freeze, it is not optimal, but you can freeze it but the texture may not be quite the same as when it was originally served.

Nutrition