PPP Picks: Itty Bitty Budget's Simple Italian Pasta Salad

Can you believe how fast time flies? It's hard to believe that it's time for another Itty Bitty Bistro feature. This week in their Itty Bitty Budget series they are featuring Simple Italian Pasta Salad. I hope you all are enjoying these budget friendly family friendly ideas as much as I am.

Simple Italian Pasta Salad

Summer time is theoretically arriving in New England any time now, so this week for Itty Bitty Budget, I wanted to make something that could be made in the morning and just chill out in the fridge all day. This simple Italian Pasta Salad was just five ingredients, came together quickly, and my kids loved it. Mission accomplished!

This recipe calls for just five ingredients, but it explodes with flavor – because I chose my ingredients carefully. Sweet Italian sausages are already seasoned enough to carry even the plainest pasta. Fire-roasted canned tomatoes are one of my new favorite finds – they are so much tastier than plain old canned tomatoes, and you can get them pre-seasoned with garlic. I reserved their juices to make into a simple vinaigrette for the pasta salad. In the end, I didn’t even need a speck of salt or pepper (though of course, you should season your salad to taste!).

This was a hearty salad, and fed my family of four for two nights.

1 bag Wacky Mac (on sale, plus a coupon) - $0.503
Perri sweet Italian sausages (they were buy one, get one free – plus I had a $1/2 coupon) - $0.96
1 can Hunt’s fire-roasted diced tomatoes with garlic (on sale) - $1.00
2 Tbsp olive oil (Costco) - $0.15
8 oz fresh mozzarella (Costco) - $1.64

Total $4.25, or (about) $2.13 a night!

For the full recipe, visit Itty Bitty Bistro.

PPP Picks: Itty Bitty Budget's Simple Italian Pasta Salad