Orzo Pesto Salad Recipe
An easy orzo pesto salad with creamy basil pesto that blends beautifully into the pasta. Toss this orzo pasta salad with feta, olives and sun-dried tomatoes for a really flavorful cold pasta salad, or try some of the suggested variations listed above.
This recipe was originally published in June 2020 and updated June 2024.
- Prep Time: 20 minutes
- Cook Time: 10
- Total Time: 30
- Yield: 8 servings 1x
- Category: Pasta
- Method: Boil
- Cuisine: Italian American
- Diet: Vegetarian
Ingredients
Units
Scale
- 1 pound orzo
- 1/4 cup pine nuts or walnuts
- 1 large garlic clove
- 1 cup grated parmesan
- 1/8 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 cup olive oil
- 4 ounces basil (about 4 large handfuls of leaves)
- 1 to 2 cups crumbled feta
- 1 cup pitted kalamata olives (whole or cut in half)
- 1 cup sun-dried tomatoes packed in oil (drained)
Instructions
- Bring 8 cups of water to a boil, adding 1 teaspoon of salt just as it begins bubbling.
- Add the orzo and cook until al dente, about 9 minutes or whatever cooking time is recommended on the packaging.
- Before draining the pasta, reserve 1/2 cup of the pasta cooking water. Set aside.
- Drain the pasta and briefly rinse in cold water. Set the orzo aside in a large bowl.
- In a food processor, blend the nuts, garlic, parmesan, salt and olive oil until smooth.
- Add the basil to the food processor. As the basil blends, pour in 1/4 cup of pasta water. Blend until smooth.
- Pour the pesto over the orzo and mix well. If the pesto seems too thick and isn’t blending in easily with the orzo, you can drizzle a little bit more of the reserved pasta water into the salad as you mix to loosen the pesto up.
- Stir in the feta, olives and sundried tomatoes.
- Taste and add salt if needed.
Notes
You can make this pasta salad ahead of time. It will keep for up to 5 days in the refrigerator, although it tastes best up to three days.
You can substitute almost any type of pasta in the recipe, although short noodles work best for cold pasta salad. Try tortellini, small shells, rotini or ditalini.
