Seafood Pasta Salad

This make-ahead Seafood Pasta Salad is a beach vacation in a bowl! Creamy pasta shells are tossed with Old Bay seasoning, lots of shrimp and crab, lemon, onion, celery and herbs.

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“I live in Virginia Beach so I used jumbo lump local crab meat and this was AMAZING! My whole family loved it!”

—Courtney

If you’ve been searching for the ultimate seafood pasta salad, your search will end right here. This is the kind of summer side dish that just feels exactly right at backyard barbecues, potlucks and beach picnics, or even laid back summer dinner parties.

With a creamy dressing and a blend of perfectly cooked pasta and seafood, it’s satisfying enough to enjoy as a cold entrée, yet versatile enough to serve as a side with everything from grilled steak to burgers or barbecue chicken. It’s that rare recipe that manages to be both effortless and impressive, which is kind of what this website is all about.

What really sets this seafood pasta salad apart from the countless others online is its bold flavor. A generous sprinkle of Old Bay seasoning gives it depth, making this salad so crave-worthy that everybody will be asking you for your recipe.

Seafood Pasta Salad Ingredients

A full recipe card, including exact ingredient amounts, appears at the bottom of this post.

• pasta – we used medium shells, since they kind of remind us of the ocean. But you can use just about any small shape. More on this below!
• mayonnaise – not “salad dressing,” please. Real mayo, Hellman’s or Duke’s preferred! We tested this with sour cream as well, but liked the all-mayo version.
• sugar – just a teaspoon, which helps bring out the natural sweetness of the crab.
• lemon juice – freshly squeezed from a real lemon.
• Old Bay seasoning – absolutely crucial to get that “New England” flavor into this crab and shrimp pasta salad. This seasoning mix includes celery salt, black pepper, crushed red pepper flakes and paprika.
• salt – for a little extra seasoning.
• shrimp – look for a bag of frozen “salad shrimp” at the store. This is very small (100+ or even 200+ per pound) cooked, peeled and deveined shrimp. Just thaw and it’s ready to eat! If you can’t find this, you can buy cooked large shrimp and chop them up into bite-sized pieces.
• crab meat – we used canned, lump crabmeat. We tested this with imitation crabmeat, and it wasn’t nearly as good. Stick with real lump crab meat.
• celery – two stalks, chopped up, for crunch!
• onion – we carefully measure this out so we’re sure we’re using just 1/4 cup. Just enough to lend the shrimp and crab pasta salad a little onion flavor, but not so much that it overpowers the flavor of the seafood. Red onion is too strong here, stick with white.
• dill – we love the flavor of fresh dill, but you can also use half the amount of dried dill.
• chives – thinly sliced green onion (green parts only) also works. If you have other fresh herbs like fresh parsley, feel free to also throw some of that in!

How To Make Shrimp Crab Pasta Salad

1. COOK PASTA. Boil the pasta in salted water according to package instructions for al dente. Drain the pasta, rinse with cold water, and then drain it again.

2. DRESSING. In a large bowl, whisk together the mayonnaise, lemon juice, sugar, Old Bay and salt until smooth.

3. FINISH. Add the shrimp, crabmeat, celery, onion, chives, dill and the drained pasta and toss everything together. For the best flavor, keep in the refrigerator at least 2 hours before serving.

Seafood Pasta Salad Variations

• DIFFERENT SEAFOOD – swap the shrimp or crab out for another type of cooked seafood, like lobster, smoked salmon, crawfish, or even canned tuna if you like it.
• ADD MORE VEGGIES – we kept this recipe simple with just celery and onion, but other veggies can make a welcome addition. Try chopped cucumber, green peas, cherry tomatoes, red bell peppers, chopped carrots or corn kernels.
• CHANGE THE PASTA SHAPE – Short pasta shapes like macaroni, rotini, shells, or ditalini all work well here. Use what you have on hand or switch it up for a new texture.

Shrimp And Crab Pasta Salad Storage

You can make and refrigerate this seafood pasta salad in an airtight container for up to two days, and we highly recommend making it the night before you plan on serving it, so the flavors have time to meld and deepen.

We don’t recommend freezing this shrimp crabmeat pasta salad. Not only will the texture of the noodles in this seafood pasta salad recipe suffer, but we don’t think the texture of the shrimp and crab will be very good after freezing and thawing.