Any suggestions? It can be vegetarian or not, but ideally I’d like a dish that is served cold (so we don’t have to worry about keeping it hot) and isn’t too complicated to make.
I thought of making an asian cold noodle salad, but the list of ingredients is as long as my arm. A pasta salad would work, I imagine. A rice dish would also be okay; I can’t really think of any cold rice dish, though.
What about a Tabouleh salad?
That sounds good, but again, long list of ingredients. Maybe a Tabouleh salad FROM SAFEWAY! 
What about a cold cucumber salad, with pomegranate seeds? It’s green and red and tangy and easy to make. I can send you the recipe, which is five ingredients long.
What about Pasta Salad?
Spiral pasta noodles(preferably mixxed color), italian dressing, Sliced or cherry tomatos, cucumber slices, and optional…pepperoni slices, mixxed and chilled. Good grub.
Ha. That’s something I would totally do. Add a few of my own ingredients (extra tomato or cucumber or something) to make it my own, put it in a bowl from home, done!
Standard macaroni salad
4 cups dry elbow mac.
**Add-ins
**
dice
1/2 each green, red, orange bell pepper
2 stalks celery
1/2 small red onion
1 small can sliced olives(don’t dice)
Dressing
2/3 cup mayo(you may want more, I like a somewhat dry salad)
1/4 cup red wine vinegar
1 TB brown mustard
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 tsp black pepper
2 tsp salt
1 clove garlic(dice fine and grind into paste with the salt)
**
Optional**
1 finely diced jalapeno(remove ribs/seeds for less heat)
seranno or habanero if you’re evil
Ah, guess I could just go ahead and post my cold cucumber salad recipe!
Seeds of one pomegranate
Two cucumbers, peeled, halved lengthwise, seeded then sliced
1/2 cup finely chopped green onions (mostly green parts)
1/4 cup cilantro
1/2 (or so, I usually increase it) feta cheese
juice of one lime
salt (to taste)
pepper (to taste)
olive oil (to taste)
Combine all ingredients, let flavors combine in refrigerator for 30 minutes or so, serve. It keeps for a few days if you have any leftovers.
Hmm, some interesting ideas. I might have to make some of these for a test run and see how they go.
When I make tabbouleh I just
That’s way fewer ingredients than some of the things listed here.
For a Christmas dinner, I would also
I’ve always had success with tri-color rotini dressed with Italian dressing topped with real parmasano reggiano
This is excellent:
Arugula-Walnut Pesto Farfalle
Pesto:
2 cups baby arugula or other greens
1 TBSP lemon zest
1 TBSP minced garlic
¼ cup toasted walnut pieces
3 TBSP olive oil
½ tsp kosher salt
¼ tsp ground pepper
12 oz. farfalle pasta (bowtie pasta)
¼ cup pasta water
¾ cup walnut pieces
¾ cup crumbled gorgonzola cheese
½ cup golden raisins
Pesto:
In a food processor, combine arugula, zest, garlic, ¼ cup of walnuts, oil, salt and pepper. Set aside.
Prepare pasta, drain well, reserving ¼ cup of pasta water. Toss with pesto. Add in remaining walnuts, cheese, raisins and reserved water. Mix well.
What about couscous salad? Just prepare a box of couscous and stir in feta cheese and olives, we also add spinach and chickpeas. My sister adds sun dried tomatoes and broccoli. It’s good hot or cold and does really well at room temperature, which is why I like it for potlucks.
A deli I worked at made a tortellini pasta salad with roasted red peppers and spinach that was very tasty and even looked sorta christmas-y.
I don’t have a recipe but if you were interested I could try and recreate it. The dressing was mostly mayonnaise, thinned with olive oil, with lots of basil and garlic. You could use the roasted red pepers that come in a jar, and frozen spinach.
Wanda’s Macaroni Salad, of course!
I wouldn’t serve a cold rice dish if there are pregnant women, old people or kids likely to eat it- food poisoning risk is too high.
I’d go-
couscous, broccoli, cherry tomatoes, scallions, rocket /arugula, feta or bocconcini and maybe pinenuts or pumpkin seeds. Dressed with lemon juice and a little white wine vinegar.
Dead easy.
Cold sesame peanut noodles (the kind that has chili garlic sauce in it) isn’t very Christmas-y, but people who like it, love it.
I’d go with that, if that’s what you were thinking of.
Since when? Seriously, I’ve never heard this meme. If food is properly refrigerated prior to serving, why would this dish be a problem? And if it’s a problem for the groups you mentioned, why isn’t it a problem for everybody? Food poisoning is not selective.
Yum! Even more tasty recipes! I think I will have to go shopping and try some out this weekend.
Yum!
Pesto Pasta salad. Your choice of pasta (macaroni, rotini, farfale, etc.), feta cheese, cherry tomatoes (quartered), frozen peas (or peas and carrots, if you prefer) and two packets of pesto sauce mix. Reconstitute the pesto sauce with 3/4 cup water. 3/4 cup olive oil, 1/4 cup of vinegar (I do half balsamic, half red wine) and cook the sauce down a little.
Boil pasta and drain. Toss hot pasta with half bag of frozen veggies (or slightly more to your preference) to thaw veggies and stop the pasta from cooking. Add cheese, pesto sauce and tomatoes; toss.
Refrigerate and serve cold.