Fancy Orzo Bake

I think what motivated me the most to start blogging again were all the delicious recipes that we try around here. I love cooking and usually end up making 1-2 new dishes a week. Chris is fantastic at trying and critiquing food. Here is our system.

1. When I see a recipe I like I star it in my google reader.
2. When it comes time to make dinner I scroll through my hundreds of starred items and pick one that I happen to have all the ingredients on hand for :)
3. I don one of my many super cute aprons and make a mess in my miniscule kitchen. Seriously. Think of the spot in your kitchen next to your sink. You know that square of counter that's barely big enough for your cooling rack? That's the size of my BIG section of counter.
4. After eating we talk about what we liked or didn't like about the meal. We decide if we would make it again and if we would, what changes we would make.
5. If the recipe is delicious enough to make again it goes in a special recipe file in my OneNote with all our changes included to the side.

This system works fantastically for me. When I have to make dinner for people I go straight to my OneNote for our tried and true recipes.

This latest recipe is being added to OneNote today. I starred the recipe thinking this is WAAAY too fancy for us. We are nowhere near that refined! But it looked yummy so it got a star. I was feeling creative last night and so into my closet, i mean, kitchen I went! The mess making was minimal. With the exception of the spinach I usually have everything in my fridge. Dinner came together in a half hour.

The original recipe calls for olive oil and Parmesan as a topping but if I wanted Chris to eat dinner I knew I had to tamper with that a bit. I solved the problem by making a light cream sauce after the veggies were cooked and before adding the spinach.

Recipe adapted from How Sweet Eats
Fancy Orzo Bake
serves 4+
1 cup orzo pasta
2 tablespoons of olive oil
1/2 sweet onion, chopped
1 red pepper, chopped (original recipe called for green (bleck!) You can use green if you want! )
1 cup of sliced mushrooms
1 T butter
1 T flour
1 c milk ( I used 1%)
3 cloves of garlic, minced
3-4 cups of raw spinach (Chris LOVES spinach so I increased the original 2c.)
1 15-ounce can of white beans, drained and rinsed (I used great northern, cannellini would work too!)
3/4 cup grated parmesan cheese (Not the stuff in a can unless you are desperate!)
1/2 c mozzarella cheese
fresh herbs for garnish, such as cilantro, parsley and basil ( I didn't have fresh so I went with dried basil)
Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.
Prepare your pasta according to the box instructions. Decrease cooking time by 1-2 minutes.
While pasta is cooking, heat a skillet over medium heat and add olive oil. Add onions and peppers and cook for about 3-4 minutes. Add in mushrooms and cook for 3 minutes more, tossing occasionally.
At this point, push your veggies to the side of the pan and add your butter to the naked part of the pan. Make a roux. Melt butter- stir in flour- let cook for a min-whisk in milk. Your veggies will work themselves into the mix as your stir and whisk. Don't worry about them :)
Add in garlic and spinach, and stir until spinach wilts, then turn heat down to low. Add in white beans and your drained mostly cooked pasta. Off the heat and add half your Parmesan. Stir it all up!
If your skillet is oven-safe top with the remaining cheeses and pop it into your oven and let it sit until things are toasty :)
If your skillet is NOT oven safe, spray a baking dish and transfer your pasta mixture. THEN top with cheeses and put in the oven.
Garnish with basil.

You can add chicken if you would like! Rotisserie chicken would be fantastic in this!