Ingredients:
for the salad:
8 oz dried orzo, cooked to package instructions and drained
1 stalk celery, sliced
1 bunch green onions, diced
3 3-oz pouches Safe Catch Elite Wild Tuna
15-oz canned chickpeas, drained
3 oz crumbled feta
1/4 cup roughly chopped Italian parsley
1/2 red onion, thinly sliced
1 (jarred, drained) fire-roasted red pepper, chopped
1/3 cup halved kalamata olives
for the dressing:
1 tablespoon tahini
juice on one lemon
2 tablespoons olive oil
zest of one lemon
salt
freshly ground black pepper
Directions:
Toss together the salad ingredients in a large bowl, set aside.
In a small bowl, whisk together dressing ingredients until smooth. Drizzle over salad, toss to evenly distribute.
My thoughts:
I love this tahini-based goddess dressing (and it’s Aldi and Trader Joe’s branded dupes) and often add it to tuna salad. Since I had actual tahini on hand, I took inspiration from the bottled dressing and made my own sesame kissed dressing to pour over the hearty salad. The tuna comes out of the pouch nicely broken up so it mixes well with orzo, which the chickpeas providing some texture in addition to extra protein. I added some feta for some tangy richness, salty olives, crisp celery and sharp red onions to round out the flavors and provide a lot of texture variety–key in any good cold pasta salad.
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