Heavenly Chicken Bow Tie Pasta Salad with Grapes and Cashews Recipe (2024)

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Chicken bow tie pasta salad is the perfect summer salad! It combines so many delicious ingredients with the crunch of cashews and creamy coleslaw dressing.

Heavenly Chicken Bow Tie Pasta Salad with Grapes and Cashews Recipe (1)

I'm all about summer parties with their spread of fresh fruit (bring on the watermelon!), lighter appetizers (you've gotta try this easy mango salsa), and all the salads. Along with my favorite strawberry spinach salad with balsamic poppy seed dressing (holy candied pecans) and easy Asian ramen salad, I love making chicken bow tie pasta salad with grapes and cashews.

I also love making cheesy pigs in a blanket but they're more about feeding my mouth than a crowd. What is it about those things? They're like crack, I swear.

Heavenly Chicken Bow Tie Pasta Salad with Grapes and Cashews Recipe (2)

One of the best thing about this bow tie chicken pasta salad is how many people it serves. If it's a side dish, which for us it usually is, I think it easily serves 12 people. As a main dish, it would still probably serve at least 8.

Heavenly Chicken Bow Tie Pasta Salad with Grapes and Cashews Recipe (3)

This recipe for chicken bow tie pasta salad is also super easy to make, especially if you use leftover grilled chicken or rotisserie chicken. Bow tie pasta salad doubles well and keeps in the fridge for three or four days.

Oh, and when serving leftovers, sprinkle on a few extra cashews as those do get a bitsoft after a day or so. But yay for extra cashews!

Heavenly Chicken Bow Tie Pasta Salad with Grapes and Cashews Recipe (4)

Most every recipe for chicken bow tie pasta salad calls for mandarin oranges. While I love fresh clementines, I can't do canned mandarin oranges so I generally leave them out. But that's what's awesome about this bow tie pasta salad—you can tweak it however you'd like!

You can leave out the cashews for nut allergies or the pineapple chunks for those crazy people who don't like the heavenly fruit. Or in my case you can nearly double the cashews.

When preparing this pasta salad recipe, I also take it a little easy on the coleslaw dressing and rarely use an entire bottle. But it all depends on how creamy you like your chicken bow tie pasta salad.

Heavenly Chicken Bow Tie Pasta Salad with Grapes and Cashews Recipe (5)

Chicken Bow Tie Pasta Salad with Grapes and Cashews

Yield: 12

Prep Time: 20 minutes

Cook Time: 10 minutes

Additional Time: 1 hour

Total Time: 1 hour 30 minutes

Chicken bow tie pasta salad is the perfect summer salad! It combines so many delicious ingredients with the crunch of cashews and creamy coleslaw dressing.

Ingredients

  • 1 (16-oz) package bow tie pasta
  • 2 cups cooked, diced chicken
  • 1 cup sliced celery
  • 1 (15-oz) can mandarin oranges in light syrup, drained
  • 1 (20-oz) can pineapple tidbits in juice, drained
  • 2 cups red grapes (whole or halved)
  • 3 green onions, chopped
  • 1 (16-oz) bottle coleslaw dressing
  • 1 (6-oz) package craisins
  • 1 cup cashews, halves & pieces

Instructions

  1. Cook pasta according to package directions. Drain and rinse with cold water to chill.
  2. Combine pasta, chicken, celery, mandarin oranges, pineapple tidbits, grapes, green onions, and coleslaw dressing in a large bowl. Toss to coat evenly.
  3. Chill at least an hour. Add craisins and cashews before serving. Garnish with more cashews.

Notes

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Nutrition Information:

Yield: 12Serving Size: 1
Amount Per Serving:Calories: 423Total Fat: 12gSaturated Fat: 2gTrans Fat: 0gUnsaturated Fat: 3gCholesterol: 36mgSodium: 457mgCarbohydrates: 60gFiber: 4gSugar: 34gProtein: 17g

Related posts:

  1. Pioneer Woman Pineapple Upside Down Cake
  2. Pioneer Woman's Ambrosia Salad
  3. Cheesecake Factory's Farfalle With Chicken and Roasted Garlic
  4. Ina Garten's Curry Chicken Salad

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Left over recipient

    Yum! Yum! And Yum!

    Reply

    • Emily

      Don't you men "leftover recipient"? Unless, of course, you're actually the leftover and not the salad... ;)

      Reply

      • Left over recipient

        Don't you mean "mean"? ;)

        Reply

        • Emily

          Nice catch. Serves me right for not proof reading my comment. ;)

          Reply

    • Emily

      You find it in the salad dressing aisle. You can buy it by the bottle. ;)

      Reply

    • Lynda Carver

      Try "Jimmy's" cole slaw dressing or "Jimmy's" Pineapple cole slaw dressing. It is in the refrigerated section usually near the pre-cut fruits. They are both soooo good!

      Reply

  2. Kristina P.

    This is my official request for a BBQ. :)

    I LOVE chicken salad.

    Reply

    • Emily

      And this one is so good! (Official request noted. We shall fulfill it this summer.)

      Reply

  3. Erin O.

    YUM! I'm SO making this for our Mother's Day BBQ!

    Reply

    • Emily

      Hopefully your family will love it as much as I do! :)

      Reply

  4. christina

    do you drain the oranges and pineapple? in syrup or juice?

    Reply

    • Emily Hill

      Yes, you do. Thanks for catching that. I've updated the recipe!

      Reply

  5. camila

    This pasta salad is out of this world amazing!! Summer vibes over here!! Love it!

    Reply

    • Emily Hill

      You're totally right about the summer vibes!

      Reply

  6. Shadi

    Yummy! This salad has everything that I love! It's perfect for entertaining and I bet everyone loves it!

    Reply

  7. Tisha

    Definitely a great summer salad, all those flavors in it!!! YUM

    Reply

    • Emily Hill

      One of the best summer salads and so easy!

      Reply

  8. Danielle

    I love this combination of ingredients! Looks so tasty!

    Reply

    • Emily Hill

      It's super delicious!

      Reply

  9. Sara

    This sounds like a great combination of flavors. Grapes in pasta salad would be awesome, I have to try that!!

    Reply

    • Emily Hill

      They really add a nice flavor!

      Reply

  10. Kim - Today's Creative Life

    so many textures, and flavors! Yum!

    Reply

    • Emily Hill

      That's what I love most about it!

      Reply

  11. Beth K

    This looks delicious! I love pasta salad!

    Reply

    • Emily Hill

      Pasta salad is definitely one of my favorite salads!

      Reply

  12. Sabrina

    These look like such disparate elements but I can totally taste the crunchy sweet combination right now and it's excellent! Looking forward to trying this!

    Reply

    • Emily Hill

      It's that crunchy sweet creamy combo that's so yummy!

      Reply

  13. Jamielyn

    This looks so yummy! Love the addition of the mandarin oranges and cashews!

    Reply

    • Emily Hill

      I usually leave out the mandarin oranges and double the cashews. ;)

      Reply

  14. Kristyn Merkley

    This Pasta Salad looks so tasty!

    Reply

    • Emily Hill

      It's ridiculously good!

      Reply

  15. Megan Clark

    I absolutely HATE raw celery. Like cooked and inside stuffing etc is fine, but in chinese food aldente, raw, or in certain things where its crunchy and stringy, uhg I hate it. Is there a sub or will i do harm to recipe leaving it out?

    Reply

    • Emily Hill

      You can totally leave it out!

      Reply

    • Rita

      I swapped out the celery with apple. Chopped them the same size size and they were delicious...

      Reply

      • Emily Hill

        That sounds like a yummy tweak!

        Reply

    • Rachel Miller

      I feel like you can tweak a lot with this recipe! I personally didn’t use any chicken, and I ran out of bowtie pasta so I added some penne. Still super yummy!

      Reply

  16. Rachel Miller

    This salad is super yummy!! 16oz is way too much dressing, my salad was basically swimming in dressing. I did realize AFTER I made the recipe that you do mention that in the blog post, but not everyone reads the whole post of recipes, so maybe put something in the actual recipe about it? Otherwise this was amazing! Super easy to make & perfect for a big crowd or cut it in half to have at home!

    Reply

  17. KELLY

    Has anyone substituted cole slaw dressing for another dressing? I have never had that dressing but don't like Cole slaw

    Reply

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Heavenly Chicken Bow Tie Pasta Salad with Grapes and Cashews Recipe (2024)

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