Description
Creamy chicken sausage orzo pasta made in one pan. Gluten free option below!
Ingredients
Scale
- 2 tbsp olive oil
- 5 (fully cooked) Italian chicken sausage links, sliced
- 1/2 of a yellow onion, diced
- 5 cloves garlic, minced
- 1 cup (uncooked) orzo (for gluten free, I like this one)
- 1/3 cup jarred roasted red peppers, chopped
- 1 tsp paprika
- 1/2 tsp Italian seasoning
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1/4 tsp black pepper
- Red pepper flakes, to taste
- 2 cups low sodium chicken broth, plus more as needed
- 1 cup baby spinach, chopped
- 1/3 cup crushed tomatoes (can sub jarred marinara sauce)
- 1 cup heavy cream
- Juice if 1/2 lemon
- Parmesan, for serving
Instructions
- Heat a large skillet over medium heat with olive oil. Add chicken sausage and allow to cook in 1 layer, undisturbed, for 5 minutes. Stir and cook another 2 minutes then remove from pan and set aside.
- Add onion, garlic, and orzo to pan. Cook for 1 minute. Add red peppers, seasonings, and broth. Bring to a boil then reduce to a simmer for about 10 minutes, stirring frequently to avoid sticking to the pan, until orzo is al dente. If your orzo is absorbing the liquid quickly, add another splash of broth.
- Stir in cream, tomatoes, and spinach. Simmer for another 5-10 minutes until more liquid is absorbed. Add lemon juice and serve with Parmesan.
I made this recipe today. Once all the ingredients were prepped it was quick and easy to prepare as you mentioned in your recipe. The only ingredient I decided to include were Crimini mushrooms. The dish is good but for me a little on the bland side which surprised me given the list of of tasty ingredients. Also, You never mentioned again when to return the sausage to the pot. Obviously I figured that out. I will have to play around with the end result to give it a bit more pop of flavor.
★★★
Yup. This one was incredible. We used a smoked chicken sausage you can get from a store like Whole Foods and man, this was killer!!
★★★★★
I used shallots instead of yellow onions and cooked the shallots, garlic, and orzo for about 3 minutes instead of 1 in order to soften the shallots. I liked it better this way than when I cooked it before with yellow onions, but either way both were very good!!
★★★★