Welcome back to Cooking with Bwog, the cooking column that brings you recipes that are healthy, cheap, easy and/or cute. This week, Cooking brings you a tasty recipe that she used to make with her mom.
Before divulging the recipe, I think I should justify why I'm posting something that I got from Real Simple. My mom cut this recipe out of the magazine about 8 years ago and we fell in love with it. It's tasty, the ingredients are easy to find and it makes a great left over (breakfast, lunch, and dinner) and because of this it's traveled with me to boarding school, foreign countries, dorm kitchens, and boyfriends' houses. Since I lost the original recipe quite a while back (and Real Simple didn't archive their recipes online until recently), I haven't actually made it the same way as the original in years. A quick web search finds the Real Simple, though - you can read and compare here (mine is real simple-er).
Chickpea Orzo Pilaf
1 big can of chickpeas, rinsed and drained
olive oil
1 onion, diced
2 carrots, cut into nickels
1-2 cups of orzo - depends on how much you want to make
2 tsp. curry powder
3 garlic cloves
4-6 cups of broth - chicken or vegetable work best.
2-3 packets of ketchup - just steal it from a deli or something
You need a big skillet or a pasta pot. It needs to be able to hold the 4-6 cups of broth.
Crush the garlic with the back of a knife to get the juice out and throw it in the big skillet/pasta pot with some olive oil (2-4 tbsp. depending on how oily you want the food). Cook at medium low flame. After a few minutes add the onion and carrots and cook until the onion starts to look clear. Then add the dry orzo pasta and the curry powder and cook until the orzo starts to brown. This part might take a while, and depending on the pan, the orzo might not brown at all. If it cooks for more than 10 minutes (or the onions and garlic start to burn) just give up on browning the orzo. Then add the broth, chickpeas, and ketchup and turn the heat up to medium high. Leave it uncovered to simmer for around 1/2 hour. How long you let it simmer really depends on what you want to eat. If you want something more like a soup, just leave it to simmer until the carrots and orzo are done. If you want something more like a pilaf, let it simmer longer. It will make your whole house smell good and makes enough for four people to eat it as an entree.
When it's done you can also put it in the fridge to chill and eat it cold. And as far as mixing it up, you can at hot chili powder, other veggies like peas, green onion or celery, a crazy broth of some kind, other beans, alphabet pasta or multicolored orzo. Serve with a salad or as a side with chicken.
