Servings 4 | Preparation Time 30 minutes
Vegan dish ready in 30 minutes. This one pot dish is quick and packed with nutrients. The texture is creamy and as cheesy flavored as you choose to make it.
Ingredients:
- 3 tbsp. extra virgin olive oil
- 4 diced garlic cloves
- 1 small diced yellow onion
- 2 tbsp. pine nuts
- 1 cup orzo
- 2 1/2 cups of water
- 2 tbsp. better than bouillon (Water and better than bouillon could be substituted with vegetable broth)
- pinch of saffron, crushed (optional)
- 1bag of spinach (pulsed to small pieces)
- 1 broccoli floret (small size), optional, with most of the stem, clean and dice in small pieces
- 2 tbsp. of nutritional yeast (adds cheesy taste)
- 1 tsp of red pepper flakes
- 1-2 tbsp. of dry oregano (optional)
- 1-2 tsp red pepper flakes
- Sea Salt and Ground black pepper to taste
Method
This one pot dish is really quick and absolutely delicious. Double the recipe if you want leftovers. Heat olive oil in a medium 3.5 qt. braiser with cover or a deep pot with a cover, add diced onions, sauté until glistening. Add diced garlic and pine nuts, stir and simmer over medium heat, add some black pepper and the red pepper flakes continue to stir for a minute. Add orzo stir until orzo is glistening, about a 1-2 minutes. Add water and bouillon (or vegetable broth), and a pinch of crushed saffron, salt and pepper to taste, combine all together, increase heat to bring mixture to a boil. Once the mixture starts boiling turn the heat down to a simmer, give it a quick stir and cover. Let the orzo cook for about 10 minutes. While the orzo is cooking fine chop or quickly pulse the spinach and broccoli, using something like a Cuisinart Food Processor, the larger 8 cup type makes this dish super quick. Uncover orzo to stir, cover again and cook for another 10 minutes. Taste the orzo it should be slightly al dente. If the orzo stuck to the bottom, just give it a vigorous stir to unstick from the pan, remove from heat. Add the spinach and broccoli, the nutritional yeast, additional salt, pepper and red pepper flakes to taste and combine all the ingredients. The heat from the orzo with soften the spinach and broccoli. Once it’s all combined it’s ready to serve.
Nutritional Note: The Spinach and broccoli maintain all their nutritional elements by not cooking them and adding these ingredients at the end.
Pairs well with:
Can be served as is or topped with a few pitted Kalamata olives, vegan feta or your favorite vegan parmesan. Serve with rustic bread and a simple tomato, cucumber vinaigrette type salad, like a village Greek salad. This dish is great on it’s own or as a side dish.
Tip:
To reheat add a touch of water.
