At Mexican birthday parties and backyard cookouts there’s usually one big bowl next to the grilled meat and the tortillas: cold elbow macaroni in a creamy, tangy dressing, studded with ham, sweet corn and bits of pickled jalapeño. That’s ensalada de coditos (en-sah-LAH-dah deh koh-DEE-tohs), literally “little elbows salad”. It looks like American deli macaroni salad, but it tastes sharper, because half the dressing is Mexican crema and the acid comes from the jalapeño can. What follows covers the one thing that makes or breaks it, the dressing that disappears overnight, plus amounts for 20 and 40 people, US and UK swaps, and how long the bowl can safely sit on a party table.
What is Mexican macaroni salad, and is it worth making?
How do you make Mexican macaroni salad? Cook 500 g (1.1 lb) of elbow macaroni for the full package time, rinse it under cold water and drain it for 10 minutes. Toss with diced ham, corn, grated carrot, celery and pickled jalapeños in a dressing of mayonnaise, Mexican crema, mustard and jalapeño brine, keeping a quarter of the dressing back to add at serving time. Chill 1 hour. 100 minutes for 10 servings.
It is a cold side salad, served by the spoonful on the same plate as the main dish. Think potluck macaroni salad with a Mexican accent: equal parts mayo and crema, jalapeño brine instead of plain vinegar, and corn as the sweet note. It’s worth making whenever you’re feeding a crowd. It’s made the day before, needs no stove on party day, and scales up without any change in technique.
Where it shines. Birthday parties, cookouts, potlucks and holiday buffets, next to carne asada, beef barbacoa or a Venezuelan pernil at Christmas.
When to skip it. If you want something light: a serving is 458 kcal, close to a main course. If there’s no fridge space to keep it cold until serving. And for anyone avoiding gluten, unless you switch to gluten-free pasta.
Real time. 100 minutes on the clock, about 30 of them hands-on, and an hour of that is the fridge doing the work.
Why macaroni salad dries out overnight, and the 25 % fix
Dry macaroni salad almost never started with too little dressing. Pasta keeps absorbing liquid after it’s cooked, and it doesn’t stop when it hits the fridge. 500 g (1.1 lb) of dry elbows weighs about 1.2 kg (2.6 lb) cooked, and that pasta spends the night soaking up the mayo and crema around it. By morning the surface looks matte and the bowl feels stiff.
The fix is simple and I don’t skip it: hold back a quarter of the dressing in a jar, about 130 g (a generous ½ cup) for this batch, and fold it in right before serving. If you make the salad a full day ahead, hold back a third.
The ratio that works. The full dressing weighs about 530 g (just under 2¼ cups) for 500 g (1.1 lb) of dry pasta, a little over 1 g of dressing per gram of dry macaroni. Less, and it’s fine for an hour and dry by the evening. Much more, and it turns pasty.
Already dry? Stir in 2 to 3 tablespoons of crema or milk per 1 kg (2.2 lb) of salad, or whatever reserved dressing is left, and give it 10 minutes in the fridge. Taste for salt last.
Ingredients and US and UK substitutes
The recipe card has the exact amounts for 10 side servings.
| Ingredient | In Mexico | US option | UK option | What changes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Pasta | coditos | elbow macaroni | macaroni or small pasta shells | nothing; any short pasta with a hollow holds dressing |
| Crema | crema mexicana | Mexican crema (dairy aisle), or sour cream | soured cream or crème fraîche | sour cream is tangier; crème fraîche is richer |
| Ham | jamón de pierna | deli ham bought in one piece | cooked gammon or thick-cut cooked ham | cubes hold up better than thin slices; never cured ham, which turns hard when cold |
| Corn | elote de lata | canned sweet corn | tinned sweetcorn | frozen corn, thawed, is a little crunchier |
| Chiles | jalapeños en escabeche | canned pickled jalapeños | jarred jalapeños | jarred slices lack the brine’s carrot and onion notes |
Mexican crema is thick, mildly tangy and slightly salty, thinner than sour cream and less sour. In the US you’ll find it in the refrigerated section of any supermarket with a Latin aisle. If you use heavy cream (double cream in the UK) instead, the salad comes out looser and blander; add an extra tablespoon of jalapeño brine.
The jalapeño brine is part of the dressing, not something to pour down the sink. It brings the acidity that keeps 220 g (1 cup) of mayo from feeling heavy.
Equipment. A 6-quart (6-liter) pot, a large colander, a 5-quart (5-liter) bowl and a jar with a lid. No big pot? Cook the pasta in two batches of 250 g (9 oz) in a 3-quart pot; crowding it means the water stops boiling and the elbows stick.
How to make it, step by step
Cook the elbows for the full package time
For a cold salad, cook the macaroni exactly as long as the package says, usually 8 to 10 minutes. Overcooked elbows split when you toss them and turn to paste in the dressing. Pulled very al dente, as you might for a hot pasta dish, they keep absorbing dressing longer in the fridge and feel unpleasantly firm once cold. I bite one halfway through and one at the end. Use 1 liter of water per 100 g of pasta (roughly 1 quart per 3.5 oz); less water gets starchy and sticky.
Rinse it, which you’d never do for hot pasta
For a hot sauce you skip the rinse, because surface starch helps the sauce cling. For a cold salad you want it gone. Rinsing keeps the elbows from setting into one block, and it cools the pasta in 3 minutes instead of letting a deep bowl sit warm for an hour. The FDA Food Code asks for cooked food to drop from 135°F (57°C) to 70°F (21°C) within 2 hours, and a deep bowl of hot pasta takes its time.
Then drain for a full 10 minutes. Water trapped inside the elbows is the reason a salad turns soupy at the bottom of the bowl.
Dress it cold, and season it twice
Mix the dressing while the pasta cooks, set aside the quarter, and toss the rest with the cold macaroni and everything else. Taste once when you mix and again after the fridge: cold dulls salt, and the second tasting almost always needs a pinch more or a splash of brine.
Who this recipe is for
- If you’re feeding a crowd → make it the day before and hold back a third of the dressing.
- If it’s your first time → the step to watch is the drain; give it the full 10 minutes.
- If you’re short on time → rinse with ice water, chill 20 minutes, add all the dressing at once and serve the same day.
- If kids are eating → leave out the jalapeños and use only 2 tablespoons of brine.
Mexican macaroni salad for 20 or 40 people
The base recipe makes 10 side servings of about 255 g (9 oz), a little over a cup each, the way it’s portioned at a party where there’s a main dish and other sides.
| People | Dry macaroni | Ham | Drained corn | Carrot | Celery | Jalapeños + brine | Mayo | Crema | Mustard |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 10 | 500 g (1.1 lb) | 300 g (10.5 oz) | 250 g (1 can) | 150 g (5 oz) | 80 g (3 oz) | 3 + 60 ml (¼ cup) | 1 cup | 1 cup | 1 tbsp |
| 20 | 1 kg (2.2 lb) | 600 g (1.3 lb) | 500 g (2 cans) | 300 g (10.5 oz) | 160 g (5.5 oz) | 6 + 120 ml (½ cup) | 2 cups | 2 cups | 2 tbsp |
| 40 | 2 kg (4.4 lb) | 1.2 kg (2.6 lb) | 1 kg (4 cans) | 600 g (1.3 lb) | 320 g (11 oz) | 12 + 240 ml (1 cup) | 4 cups | 4 cups | 4 tbsp |
Scaling notes. Cook the pasta in batches of 1 kg (2.2 lb) in 10 liters (10 quarts) of water. Mix in a 12-quart container or two bowls, and store it in containers no deeper than 3 inches (7.5 cm) so it chills fast. The reserved dressing scales too: about 260 g (1 cup) for 20 and 520 g (2 cups) for 40. For 50 people, use 2.5 kg (5.5 lb) of dry pasta.
Make-ahead plan for a party
- Two days before → buy everything; check you have fridge space for a 5-quart (5-liter) bowl.
- The day before → make the whole salad and keep the reserved dressing in its own jar.
- Party day → fold in the reserved dressing 10 minutes before serving, taste, and put out half the bowl.
How long can macaroni salad sit out?
Two hours in total out of the fridge, and one hour if it’s above 90°F (32°C), per USDA FSIS guidance on perishable food. After that it goes in the trash, even if it looks and smells fine.
Commercial mayonnaise is acidic and usually isn’t the culprit; the pasta, the ham and the dairy are what spoil in the heat, as the Arizona Department of Health Services points out in its picnic safety sheet. What I do: serve half, keep the other half in the fridge and swap bowls, or set the serving bowl inside a bigger one filled with ice. Homemade mayo with raw egg doesn’t go to a party.
Fridge. Per the USDA cold storage chart, mayo-based macaroni salads keep 3 to 4 days at 40°F (4°C) or below, provided they went in within 2 hours. With pineapple or a yogurt dressing, I’d eat it within 2 days.
Freezer. No. The FSIS lists this kind of salad as not freezing well: the mayo separates and the pasta thaws soft and watery.
Mistakes that ruin it
- Dry the next day → the pasta drank the dressing. Hold back a quarter; rescue with crema or milk.
- Soupy at the bottom → the pasta wasn’t drained. Ten full minutes in the colander.
- Broken, mushy elbows → overcooked. Package time, then cold water. No fix once it happens.
- Bland straight from the fridge → cold mutes salt. Taste after chilling; add salt or brine.
- Greasy dressing → it was mixed into warm pasta. Cool the pasta first. No fix either.
Heat level, 1 out of 5. Three chopped pickled jalapeños in 10 servings mostly add tang.
Allergens. Wheat (gluten) from the pasta, egg from the mayo, milk from the crema, and mustard, which is a declarable allergen in the UK. Some deli hams contain soy or milk; check the label.
Variations, from tuna to the sweet pineapple version
- Tuna → two cans of tuna in water, drained (330 g / 11.5 oz), instead of the ham, plus the juice of half a lime in the dressing. A good pantry dinner.
- Chicken → 300 g (10.5 oz) of cooked, shredded chicken breast; leftover chicken from chicken tinga before it goes into the sauce works.
- Sweet, with pineapple → 200 g (7 oz) of drained canned pineapple chunks, folded in at the end. It’s the birthday-party version kids go for. Pineapple releases juice, so eat it within 2 days.
- Lighter → swap half the mayo for plain Greek yogurt: about 75 kcal and 8 g of fat less per serving, a tangier salad, and some whey separating after day 2.
- Vegetarian → skip the ham; add 150 g (5 oz) of cubed Monterey Jack or mild cheddar and 150 g (1 cup) of cooked peas.
What to serve it with
A plate of grilled steak with warm tortillas and pico de gallo is the classic party combination; count on about 255 g (9 oz) of salad per guest when it shares the plate with a main. At a holiday table it sits next to Mexican Christmas Eve salad, and if you’re cooking Venezuelan-style, it’s a cousin of the potato-based Venezuelan chicken salad. And if there’s a second bag of elbows in the pantry, the toasted-pasta technique from sopa de fideo turns it into a quick soup.
How much does it cost?
Using US city average prices from the Bureau of Labor Statistics for August 2026, boneless ham runs $5.382/lb and pasta $1.374/lb. The 300 g (10.5 oz) of ham cost about $3.56 and the 500 g (1.1 lb) of macaroni about $1.51, so the ham alone is more than twice the pasta. The BLS doesn’t track mayonnaise, sour cream, canned corn or pickled jalapeños, so I’m not putting a made-up total on the bowl. The protein is where the money goes: leftover chicken or canned tuna is the cheapest way to make a big batch.
FAQ
Why is my macaroni salad dry the next day? Cooked pasta keeps absorbing dressing in the fridge. Hold back a quarter of the dressing, about 130 g (½ cup) per 500 g (1.1 lb) of pasta, and add it before serving.
Should you rinse pasta for macaroni salad? Yes, under cold water until cold to the touch, then drain 10 minutes. It stops the elbows sticking and cools them fast.
What’s the difference between Mexican and regular macaroni salad? Half the dressing is Mexican crema instead of all mayo, the acid is pickled jalapeño brine, and corn and ham are standard.
How much macaroni salad do I need for 50 people? About 2.5 kg (5.5 lb) of dry macaroni, with everything else scaled from the table above, for side portions of roughly 255 g (9 oz).
How long can Mexican macaroni salad sit out? Two hours, or one hour above 90°F (32°C), according to USDA FSIS. Then discard it.
How long does it keep in the fridge? 3 to 4 days at 40°F (4°C) or below; 2 days with pineapple or yogurt.
Can you freeze macaroni salad? No. The dressing separates and the pasta turns watery when it thaws.
What can I use instead of Mexican crema? Sour cream in the US, soured cream or crème fraîche in the UK. Sour cream makes it a little tangier.
Nutrition per serving
Per serving (about 255 g / 9 oz, one of 10), calculated ingredient by ingredient from USDA FoodData Central (SR Legacy) with this recipe’s amounts, using sour cream as the stand-in for crema and leaving out the salt in the cooking water:
- Calories: 458 kcal
- Protein: 13 g
- Carbohydrates: 46 g
- Fat: 25 g, of which 5 g saturated
- Fiber: 3 g
- Sugars: 5 g
- Sodium: 804 mg
The ham, the jalapeños with their brine and the mayonnaise account for most of the sodium; chicken instead of ham brings it down to about 580 mg.
I grew up in Venezuela with a different cold party salad, chicken and potato, and came to this one later, through Mexican cooking. The first batch I made was perfect at midnight and a solid block by lunchtime. These days the jar of reserved dressing sits next to the bowl in the fridge, and it’s the last thing I touch before the salad goes out. Josnaisis.