• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer

A Seasoned Greeting

  • About Catherine
  • Recipes
  • Main Dishes
  • Printables
  • Let’s Connect
Home » Buffalo Chicken Pasta Salad

Buffalo Chicken Pasta Salad

April 11, 2021 by aseasonedgreeting 2 Comments

Sharing is caring!

11683 shares
  • Share
  • Tweet
Jump to Recipe·Print Recipe

Raise your hand if you like all things Buffalo chicken! Is your hand raised? Good, mine is too! I’ve created this Buffalo Chicken Pasta Salad for all my fellow Buffalo sauce lovers. Enjoy all that spicy flavor in a cold and creamy pasta salad perfect for lunches or a summer cook out!

Packed with all the flavors you’d expect from a Buffalo chicken recipe, and use rotisserie chicken to make this extra easy!

overhead shot of the buffalo chicken pasta salad in a white bowl

Ingredients

Here’s what you need to make this recipe!

Macaroni. You can use your favorite brand of elbow noodles. You’ll use 2 and 1/2 cups for this pasta salad.
Rotisserie chicken. This is the trick that makes this pasta salad so easy! No need to cook your own chicken, just use 1 and 1/2 cups of shredded rotisserie chicken. Saves time!
Hot sauce, ranch, and sour cream. Combine these to make the dressing for the pasta salad. Use your favorite brands, but since these are the main ingredients for the sauce I recommend buying the best quality you can.
Blue cheese. If you’re not a blue cheese lover you can leave this out and swap for Mozzarella cheese.
Scallions and celery. These will add a nice pop of green to the pasta salad! I like to cut the celery super small so that it adds a nice crunch, but not overwhelming celery flavor to each bite.

overhead shot of the ingredients. Blue cheese crumbles, noodles, sour cream, hot sauce, ranch dressing, scallions, celery, rotisserie chicken.

How to make the pasta salad

Cook the pasta. Cook your macaroni noodles, strain them, then add to a large bowl. I found 2 and 1/2 cups of dry macaroni noodles was enough!

Make the dressing. In a large bowl combine 1/2 cup of hot sauce, 1/2 cup of ranch dressing, and 3/4 cup of sour cream.

silver bowl mixing the ranch, sour cream, and hot sauce.

Combine the dressing and the cooked macaroni. Pour the dressing over the noodles and stir to coat.

pouring the dressing over the cooked noodles.

Add in the fixins. Once the noodles are coated with the dressing, pour in the diced celery, blue cheese, scallions, and shredded chicken.

Chill. Put the bowl in the fridge and allow to chill for at least 2 hours before serving.

mixing the ingredients into the pasta salad.

Ok Buffalo chicken lovers, there are some of my other recipes that feature spicy Buffalo sauce!

Buffalo Chicken Meatballs are the perfect party appetizer! All the flavors of chicken wings without the mess, and no bones!
Want a spicy burger? Buffalo Chicken Burgers will be a hit at your next cook out!
Buffalo Chicken Taquitos are a fun and easy dinner! Crunchy taquitos you can dip in ranch or blue cheese.
Similar to this pasta salad, I’ve also got a Buffalo Chicken Pasta! This is a hot recipe even loaded with crispy bacon.
Last for the spicy recipes, these Spicy Pretzel Bites are homemade pretzel balls brushed with Buffalo sauce for an appetizer with a kick!

If you want more easy pasta salad recipes, one of my most popular is this French Dressing Pasta Salad!

overhead shot of the buffalo chicken pasta salad in a white bowl, in the back a white plate with 2 forks.

Cooking tips

  • Pasta salads in my opinion are best eaten fresh, the day they are made. They can loose some of the creaminess and sauciness after sitting in the fridge for a day or more. If you have to make this the day before, I’d recommend either increasing the sauce quantities a bit, or making an extra side of the sauce so you can mix it in before serving the pasta salad.
  • If you don’t like blue cheese crumbles you can substitute with another cheese, like Mozzarella.
  • Dice the celery very small. It will add a nice crunch to each bite without adding too much of an overwhelming celery flavor.
  • I’d rate this a medium on the spice level. Want extra heat? Increase the hot sauce or you can even add a few dashes of cayenne pepper if you want a super spicy dish!
Print

Buffalo Chicken Pasta Salad

overhead shot of buffalo chicken pasta salad in a white bowl
Print Recipe

5 Stars 4 Stars 3 Stars 2 Stars 1 Star

5 from 1 review

A spicy pasta salad perfect for any cook out! Macaroni noodles covered in a Buffalo sauce for a spicy and creamy snack!

  • Author: aseasonedgreeting
  • Prep Time: 10 minutes
  • Cook Time: 2 hours
  • Total Time: 2 hours 10 minutes
  • Yield: About 8 servings
  • Category: Appetizer
  • Method: Mix
  • Cuisine: American

Ingredients

2 and 1/2 cups elbow noodles
1 and 1/2 cups shredded rotisserie chicken
3/4 cup sour cream
1/2 cup crumbled blue cheese
1/2 cup ranch dressing
1/2 cup hot sauce
1/3 cup small diced celery
1/4 cup diced scallions

Instructions

1. Cook the macaroni according to package instructions.

2. Make the dressing by combining the sour cream, ranch dressing, and hot sauce.

3. Combine the cooked noodles, prepared dressing, the scallions, celery, chicken, and blue cheese. Stir to combine, then chill in the fridge for at least 2 hours before serving. 

Notes

Pasta salads in my opinion are best eaten fresh, the day they are made. They can loose some of the creaminess and sauciness after sitting in the fridge. If you have to make this the day before, I’d recommend either increasing the sauce or making an extra side of the sauce so you can mix it in before serving the pasta salad.

I’ve found that different brands elbow noodles can vary slightly in size. I used Barilla here and found 2 and 1/2 cups was enough noodles.

Did you make this recipe?

Tag @aseasonedgreeting on Instagram

« Baked Penne Vodka
Chorizo Shakshuka »

Filed Under: Appetizer

Subscribe

for your weekly recipe fix.

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. AvatarDonna R Longenecker

    July 27, 2024 at 7:58 pm

    Creamy and delicious! I followed the recipe as written.

    Reply
    • Avataraseasonedgreeting

      July 28, 2024 at 12:00 am

      So glad you liked it!

      Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Recipe rating 5 Stars 4 Stars 3 Stars 2 Stars 1 Star

Primary Sidebar

Footer

Menu

  • About Catherine
  • Easy and inspired recipes for your busy life
  • Legal and Privacy Policy
  • Let’s Connect
  • Printables
  • Recipes

Copyright © 2025 A Seasoned Greeting on the Foodie Pro Theme

11683 shares