Liven up your Labour Day menu with this fun vintage pasta salad recipe

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Labour Day falls early this year - the earliest date it can in fact, September 1st, and as such that means that this weekend is the last before the unofficial end of summer. Soon life will become a joyful hustle and bustle of school books, raking crunchy leaves, baking pumpkin pies, nights that get dark nearly as soon as work as wrapped up, and the switching over of our warm weather wardrobes to our winter ones (or vice versa if you live south of the equator and gearing up to say hello to spring once more). And you know what, a good part of me really and truly looks forward to that, but for now I'm very keen to continue celebrating summer (as I talked in greater detail about in this month's edition of Flickr Favourites) and soak up every last precious, golden sun-kissed moment of it while I still can.



{Instead of viewing Labour Day long weekend as the beginning of the end of summer, I prefer to see it as one last big celebration of all that is great, food very much included, about this fun filled, vibrant, awesome season.Image source.}


This sentiment definitely extends to my menu choices, especially since the Labour Day long weekend has always been one of the most revered on the barbeque and al fresco meal front of the whole season. There's hefty ears of sweet corn, plump ruby red tomatoes, scores of crisp garden greens, early season apples and pears, freshly caught fish, homemade ice cream, and gallons of lemonade still to consume before we don our Thanksgiving finery and tuck into a squarely autumn harvest centered feast once more.

Undoubtedly one of my favourite warm weather eats of all time is pasta salad! I have a dozen or more favourite recipes that I enjoy whipping up as the mood and menu call for, and am certainly not opposed to trying new ones or simply tossing something together on the fly based on what I have in the fridge and pantry at any given moment. It's precisely that kind of spirit which I feel today's vintage pasta salad recipe that originally appeared in a Good Housekeeping magazine ad for Somerset Luncheon Meats channels. It has a little of this, a little of that, and a whole lot of mid-century mealtime fun.




{A tasty hodgepodge of mid-century ingredients comes together in this cheerful, filling 1950s pasta salad recipe, that is sure to find favour with kids and adults alike at your long weekend dinner table. Image source.}


Now, by all means, feel free to forgo or swap out anything that not to your liking. If you're a gluten-free eater like myself and are keen to still use rainbow pasta here, I highly recommend Rizopia's Vegetable Brown Rice Fusilli (which I've found here in Canada at Bulk Barn and online on Well.ca), which I'm rarely without a bag of in my cupboard for pasta salads just like this. For the mayonnaise, needing to avoid eggs all the time, too, due to the fact that I'm allergic to them, I reach for Reduced Fat Vegenaise (which also happens to be vegan).

Pasta salads are one of the most versatile, crowd pleasing foods around. You can serve them cold, at room temperature or even warm, just depending on what your star ingredients are. They often taste even better the second day after their flavours have been mingling and snuggling up together for a while, and they can be either the main attraction of the meal or simply a lovely, filling side dish.

If you have leftovers, why not stir in some cooked chicken breast, salmon, strips of steak, further vegetables, or cubes of cheese and extend it for a second meal the next day? They can also be stuffed into pitas, wraps, or buns, as well as scooped up onto corn chips, potato chips, melba toast, or wedges of cornbread - all of which children in particular are fond of.

Let your imagination run wild when it comes not only to creating pasta salads, but also with your Labour Day meal choices in general. Take advantage of summer's incredible eats while they're still here, have a second (or third) helping of sweet, juicy watermelon, toss some more burgers on the grill, and relish (food pun intended) the tail end of awesome quarter of the year while it's still going strong.

A wonderful 1940s way with watermelon salad

Watermelon and summer go hand-in-suntanned-hand like winter and hot cocoa, spring and chocolate eggs, and autumn and pumpkin pie. They're a longstanding, hugely beloved favourite pairing the world over and though certain modern cookery writers might have you believe that they invented watermelon salads (Nigella's thoroughly scrumptious watermelon, feta, and black olive salad spring to mind in this regard), such – as we’ll see today – is certainly not the case.

It's a safe bet to say that watermelon is most often eaten in it's natural state, be it room temperate or pleasing chilled, but that doesn't mean it's a stranger to being used in recipes either. From sorbets to margaritas, jams to smoothies, the creative uses for this immensely refreshing fruit are nearly limitless.

I adore watermelon, though it's been tricky (as with most fruits) for me to eat for numerous years now, I still indulge in a small portion periodically during the summer months - how can one not, when a good, sweet, lip-lickingly juicy watermelon tastes better than any candy and is packed with oodles of vitamin C, vitamin A, and lycopene?

Without a doubt, one of my favourite ways to enjoy watermelon is in a salad, be it sweet or savory, the later of which I've been making a pasta salad with involving a honey and blood orange dressing for years now, as well as a mixed greens gem that involves chives and grilled chicken. I'm also a huge fan of the aforementioned pairing of feta, olive and watermelon, and have yet to serve that combination to anyone who didn't instantly go gaga for it.

While recently perusing one of my most beloved vintage ad and recipe websites, Found in Mom's Basement, I came across an intriguing sounding recipe from 1947 for a spice filled dressing to be partnered with melon salad. Interestingly, Wesson oil didn't name this dressing or recipe as a whole, so I've decided to dub it Summery Citrus and Watermelon Salad in a Mustard Paprika Dressing.




{If you don't have one already, why not invest in a melon baller so that you can make picture perfect balls of fruit like those shown in today's charming 1940s watermelon salad recipe? Image source.}


Now, I'm the first to admit that watermelon and mustard are not a pairing I've often craved in the same forkful, but it's sometimes the curious flavour combinations that prove to be the most delicious, so the next time we pick up a watermelon, I think I'll give this forties side dish a spin.

If you're squarely against the idea of the two together - may I first suggest ditching the dry mustard and replacing both it and some of the oil with your favourite (store bought or homemade) honey mustard dressing?

Still not a fan, then scrap it entirely, perhaps subbing in a bit more citrus juice and peel. I love the taste of onions and watermelon together, so I'd also suggest trying some tender green onions, thinly sliced shallots, or red onions here as well. Should you happen to be a fan of radishes, I also find they - to borrow a phrase from my friends in the UK - go down a treat with watermelon.

This salad would be splendid made with honeydew, cantaloupe, or casaba melon (the later of which is usually very melon in flavour, thus making it great for recipes where you don't want the melon taste to dominate the dish). You could also try it with apples, peaches, nectarines, grapes, or even pineapple, just depending on your tastes and what's in season.

Hard as it may be to believe, we're now half way through August and just a little over a month away from the official end of summer, which is all the more reason to skittle down to the nearest grocery store or farmer's market (should you happen to be lucky enough to live somewhere with locally grown melon) and pick yourself up another watermelon or two while they're still at the peak of their season.

Serve it up in a fun salad, skewered on a fruit kebab, chopped up in a salsa, simply as is, or any other way your heart desires. The secret isn't so much in how you serve watermelon during the summer, but rather that you dish it up and savour its succulent flavour point blank - just remember to keep a stack of napkins handy to help wipe up all that fabulous juice when you do! :)

1950s Peach Blossom Salad is just the ticket for warm weather meals

✯ Day 138 of Vintage 365 ✯

 

Perhaps no other category of vintage food is more mocked, scrutinized and talked about than salads. From gelatinous concoctions filled with everything from shrimp to horseradish, bananas to peanuts, to ingredient combinations that would likely make today's most daring foodie quickly dart an eyebrow upwards, it's fair to say that while the rap vintage salads has gotten isn't entirely warranted, it does make a fair bit of sense.

However, just because a dish veers from our current nom, doesn't mean it doesn't have the potential to be delicious. While there are certain vintage salad recipes I've stayed away from like the plague (sorry, but anything involving jellied meat or seafood is just does not float my culinary boat!), I've very much enjoyed experimenting with salad recipes culled from cookbooks of the 30s, 40s and 50s over the last several years.

Some have been hair-raising experiences, others became instant favourites, and a good many simply got folded into my mealtime reportraire , to be brought out particularly when the weather starts to heat up and a stuffy, air conditioning (stove vent-less) kitchen suddenly becomes akin a Amazon rain forest.

Recently while bopping about Flickr, I spied a vintage salad recipe that practically screams "1950s" (and indeed, that's the fabulous decade it hails from). Comprised of considerably fewer ingredients than many old school salads, this fruit-featuring dish, with its ginger infused dressing, sounds rather lovely.

{Cheerfully hued 1950s Del Monte ad with Peach Blossom Salad recipe via vintage.kitten on Flickr. Click here for a larger version of this neat vintage recipe.}

Calling for several commonplace foods that many of us have on hand most of the time (canned peaches, marshmallows, celery, walnuts, etc), this sugar salad looks like a snap to toss together, while having the added pleasure of being one of those dishes that doesn't stand to break the bank.

I might swap the heavy cream in the dressing for light or even buttermilk (to shave off a few calories and grams of fat), but other than that, I think this recipe for Peach Blossom salad (how cute is that name?!) sounds rather tasty, filling and fun precisely as it is.

While marshmallows, maraschino cherries and canned peaches might not appear in the same dish on many menus today, I think that a homey, inviting salad like this deserves to resurrected and enjoyed again come those mind-bendingly warm days of summer, when one really doesn't want to do anything more labour intensive in the kitchen than turn the handle on a can opener and quickly whip up a pleasing meal for the whole family.