15 Minute Florentine Pasta Salad Recipes

Chicken Florentine Pasta, an easy creamy chicken and pasta dinner recipe with bowtie pasta coated in lightened-up fresh spinach Florentine Sauce and black pepper chicken. Needs only 15 minutes of prep. Perfect for weeknights. My version of Florentine Sauce is special. It creamy yet lite with delicious flavor of star-ingredient - spinach. Just three things make all the difference: To lighten-up the sauce, I replace heavy cream with half-and-half. (half the cream and half the milk).Add herbs, sun-dried tomatoes, and chicken stock to add more depth of flavor. Use fresh spinach instead of frozen to control the amount of liquid in the sauce.The resulting sauce is perfect to coat pasta and has amazing flavor of spinach. Every bite just melts in mouth.I highly recommend trying the recipe. Needs only 15 minutes of prep. Cut the dinner time in half by making ahead sauce up-to a week in advance. Cook chicken in advance or use rotisserie/grilled chicken. On weeknights, cook fresh bowtie pasta, heat sauce, add chicken. Wallah! Dinner is ready to devour!I words of Ina Garten, "How easy was that?!" So, let's make some Chicken Florentine Pasta tonight!CREAMY CHICKEN FLORENTINE SAUCE Florentine (in food context) means food served on bed of spinach. The signature Florentine Spinach Sauce was my inspiration to make this creamy chicken Florentine Pasta. Like I mentioned, to lighten-up the sauce, I replaced the heavy cream in sauce with half and half i.e. part heavy cream and part milk. This also makes sauce right consistency to work with pasta.For lite homey summer dinner flavor, I flavored the sauce with sun-dried tomatoes, herbs and chicken stock. A subtle tang of sun-dried tomatoes helps cut the richness and make sauce extra-special. You will love the flavors. Tip: If you don't have sun-dried tomatoes, use zest of a lemon. You can also fold in fresh cherry tomatoes in the sauce. FROZEN VS FRESH SPINACH?Any day, I will choose fresh spinach over frozen. Simply because I always have fresh spinach in refrigerator as we love using it as base for summer salads. Specially for Florentine sauce, fresh spinach is better than frozen. Frozen thawed spinach still holds lot of water and is not that easy to squeeze. No mater what, it will retain some water. This water can dilute the sauce or bland the flavor for sure. In Florentine sauce, spinach is the star. So, to control the amount of liquid in sauce, I used fresh spinach. I cook fresh spinach with pinch of salt and a tsp oil in skillet until it is wilted. Then let it drain while I prepare the rest of sauce. This helps to make much silky and never-watery. Let me summarize why should you try this Chicken Pasta tonight!Easy to prepare with only 15 minutes of prep.Creamy yet lite sauce. Perfect for summer dinner.Delicious and versatile Florentine Sauce loaded with spinach flavor. Make once use multiple ways. Make Florentine Pasta, Florentine Pizza or serve as dip with Garlic Bread.This recipe is a true example of make-it-your-own Pasta Dinner. Use any kind of protein: fresh cooked chicken, rotisserie or grilled, shrimp, or even skip chicken and add some broccoli, cherry tomatoes, and red bell peppers for vegetarian florentine pasta dinner.MORE CHICKEN AND PASTA DINNER RECIPES:If your family is Chicken and Pasta dinner fan like ours? I have few more delicious recipes to try:Chicken Bellagio with Creamy Sauce PastaChicken Paprikash with PastaThai Curry Chicken NoodlesParmesan Chicken CapreseCajun Chicken PastaChicken Tequila FettuccineChipotle Chicken Cream Sauce PastaTry something different for dinner tonight. I have made nostalgic buffet-favorite Chicken Florentine easy to prepare at home as complete meal. Pasta with flavorful saucy Chicken Florentine. Drop a message and share with me your favorite Chicken and Pasta Dinner?Happy Cooking!

Provided by Savita

Categories     Pasta     Main Course

Time 35m

Number Of Ingredients 13

• Ingredients

Quick and easy hot teriyaki salad with wilted spinach.

Provided by Sue

Categories     Salad     100+ Pasta Salad Recipes     Vegetarian Pasta Salad Recipes

Time 25m

Yield 8

Number Of Ingredients 8

• Ingredients

Nutrition Facts : Calories 284.2 calories, Carbohydrate 53.3 g, Fat 2.8 g, Fiber 3.5 g, Protein 11.3 g, SaturatedFat 0.4 g, Sodium 1412.3 mg, Sugar 8.7 g

Make and share this Pasta Florentine Salad recipe from Food.com.

Provided by Dancer

Categories     Chicken

Time 10m

Yield 4 serving(s)

Number Of Ingredients 7

• Ingredients

Nutrition Facts : Calories 990.9, Fat 61, SaturatedFat 9.3, Cholesterol 25.9, Sodium 41.9, Carbohydrate 89.3, Fiber 4.7, Sugar 3.2, Protein 22.1

Fresh, fast, fantastic! Create a yummy pasta salad in no time with a little help from packaged fresh pasta and pesto sauce. Recipe is great as is or make it your own by adding grilled shrimp or chicken, fresh mushrooms, green peas, carrots, sun-dried tomatoes, etc. Found this recipe in BHG, May 1990. Enjoy!

Provided by Mrs.Jack

Categories     Lunch/Snacks

Time 15m

Yield 8 serving(s)

Number Of Ingredients 8

• Ingredients

Nutrition Facts : Calories 133.3, Fat 3.7, SaturatedFat 0.3, Cholesterol 23.3, Sodium 15.9, Carbohydrate 21, Fiber 0.8, Sugar 1.5, Protein 4.8

This is the salad that was served in the old Maas Brothers dining room. I loved this as a child and serched everywhere until I found a recipe that tasted the way I remembered.

Provided by Chihuahua Girl

Categories     Low Cholesterol

Time 30m

Yield 6 serving(s)

Number Of Ingredients 8

• Ingredients

Nutrition Facts : Calories 259.4, Fat 15, SaturatedFat 3.1, Cholesterol 15.4, Sodium 528.9, Carbohydrate 25.6, Fiber 1.6, Sugar 15.4, Protein 7.8