Recipe: Spinach Bow Ties, Beet Bowties, and a great Asian Tuna Pasta Salad with Veggies

Last year, I made Pumpkin Bowtie Pasta.  It was a blast, and delicious.

Tonight, it was 84 degrees in my house when I got home.  Yuck.  Our house has terrible circulation, and we don't have the A/C in yet.  It's a problem.

Since I made those nice salads last night, I wanted to do something different tonight.  I've been wanting to make more pasta, and it's been a while.  But it was too hot for standard pasta.  So, I decided to make pasta salad.  With homemade tri-color pasta.

Here are the recipes for the Whole Wheat Beet Pasta Dough and the Whole Wheat Spinach Pasta Dough.  I only used about 1/4 of each recipe for the bowties tonight.  The rest of the dough is in the fridge, to make more pasta later this week.  These recipes make about 1/2 lb of dough each.  I made them in my food processor, but you could make them in your stand mixer, your bread machine, or by hand if need be.

Whole Wheat Beet Pasta Dough with Flax Seed


1/2 can sliced beets, drained
1 Tbsp olive oil
~1 c whole wheat flour
~1 c white flour
1/4 c flax seed meal
2 eggs


Combine beets and olive oil in a food processor and puree as finely as possible. Add other ingredients, pulse to combine, and then process until it forms a ball of dough. It should not be sticky. If it is too sticky, add more flour. If it is too crumbly, add some of the liquid drained from the beets.


Roll (a pasta machine makes this easier) very thin, then cut into desired shapes. Let dry ~15 minutes, then boil ~3 minutes in salted water.

Whole Wheat Spinach Pasta Dough with Flax Seed

~1 c white flour
~1 c wheat flour
1/4 c flax seed meal
1 10-oz package of frozen spinach, thawed and squeezed dry
1 egg

Combine in a food processor and pulse to combine. Continue processing until it forms a solid ball. If it is too sticky, add more flour. If it is too dry, add some water (or liquid drained from the spinach). Let dough rest ~15 minutes (or store in fridge for up to 3 days)


Roll (a pasta machine makes this easier) very thin, then cut into desired shapes. Let dry ~15 minutes, then boil ~3 minutes in salted water.

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I formed everything into bowties tonight.  You can cut them into rectangles by hand to make the bowties, but I have this great gadget called a Pasta Bike.  I'm a gadget junkie, admittedly.

(I forgot to take a picture of my pumpkin bowties, but you can visit the old post if you would like to see them separately.)

The kids helped to form the bowties.  They also help to roll the dough through the pasta machine.  It's a family affair.

Here's the salad that I made.  It was totally thrown together with things that sounded good tonight - tuna, yellow pepper, broccoli slaw, sundried tomatoes, parsley, the cooked and drained pasta, and some Light Asian Sesame Ginger Soy dressing.

It was delicious.