How To Turn Leftover Cooked Orzo Into A Delicious Late-summer Salad – Recipe

I rarely, if ever, bargain orzo, nan rice-shaped pasta, but I was intrigued by barbecue cook Melissa Thompson’s canvass connected her Instagram stories asking: “Do you person a half-finished container of orzo sitting successful your cupboard?” She had much than 600 responses, almost 90% of which said yes. Thompson turned hers into a salad pinch pepper, outpouring onion, tomatoes and cucumber. Inspired, I rushed retired to bargain a container (yes, I spot nan irony, too) and made a crockery utilizing leftovers. And, of course, ended up pinch half a container of orzo successful my cupboard.

Orzo salad: an anti-recipe

I’ve called this an anti-recipe because I deliberation recipes are often blameworthy of creating nutrient discarded by being excessively prescriptive. I want you to navigator pinch love, assurance and creativity, utilizing up immoderate you tin find. So, usage orzo if you person it; if not, different pasta aliases moreover a atom tin beryllium quickly cooked up to create a satiating salad.

Build an imaginative repast utilizing leftovers saved from a erstwhile lunch. Stale aliases out-of-date – but still safe to eat – nuts, seeds and spices. You tin show if they’re disconnected by nan rancid, oily smell and bitter taste. Other foods you tin revive and reuse: wrinkly veg and wilted herbs from nan crisper drawer (revived successful crystal water), tinned aliases stiff vegetables, and likelihood and ends of cheese.

Serves 2 arsenic a main aliases 6 arsenic a side

All ingredients and quantities are optional and should beryllium added to taste

For nan salad
300-400g cooked orzo (from astir 125-150g uncooked)
130-260g cooked beans aliases pulses (eg ½-1 tin drained cannellini, brownish lentils aliases kidney beans)
200-300g vegetables, cooked aliases earthy (eg, stiff peas, diced boiled saccharine potatoes, greenish peppers)
100-200g cheese (eg, feta, parmesan, cheddar), sliced aliases crumbled
50-100g toasted nuts and/or seeds (eg, cashews, almonds, peanuts, pumpkin aliases sesame seeds)
50-100g different shop cupboard ingredients (eg, sun-dried tomatoes, dried apricots, sultanas)
30-50g caller soft herbs (eg, parsley, coriander, mint), stalks finely chopped, leaves astir chopped
Other leftovers, to sensation – I had a mini magnitude of fennel frond pesto crockery (recipe coming up successful a mates of weeks), which I added to nan mix.

For nan dressing
Leftover crockery dressings (eg, caesar, French, chromatic and mustard), aliases drizzle connected 2–4 tbsp lipid (eg, extra-virgin oliva oil, avocado oil, hemp oil) and 1–2 tbsp citrus juice, vino vinegar aliases ume vinegar (see my apricot umeboshi recipe for nan latter)

Tip nan cooked and cooled pasta into a ample bowl. Now build nan crockery for illustration a buddha bowl, arranging each constituent broadside by side, truthful you tin spot precisely what you’ve sewage earlier mixing.

Add nan beans aliases pulses, followed by nan cooked and earthy vegetables. Add nan cheese, past sprinkle complete nan nuts and seeds.

Top pinch thing other you person successful nan cupboard that’s packed pinch flavour, specified arsenic sun-dried tomatoes aliases dried fruit.

Finish pinch nan chopped soft herbs, past dress to sensation (if you’ve sewage conscionable a small dressing near successful nan bottle, bulk it retired pinch a scatter of lipid and citrus juice aliases vinegar). Mix, taste, set and serve.