The Pasta Series – Tomato Pesto and Sausage Orzo Dish

Welcome to the second instalment of The Pasta Series. The recipes in the ‘The Pasta Series’ will mainly use pantry items or easily accessible ingredients so it is easy for everyone. This one is such a good one to hide secret veggies in for children or fussy boyfriends. Also, can we just talk about Orzo for a second, such an underrated pasta, it looks like rice but it’s pasta! Anyway moving on…

This dish involves making your own pesto, which is very easy however there are tomato pestos on the market which are vegan. If you’re making your own pesto then you can either use a food processor or a pestle and mortar.

Ingredients

1. Orzo Pasta
2. 400g Chestnut Mushrooms
3. 1 Red Onion
4. Vegan Sausages (Shroomdogs from Sainsbury’s are one of my favourites)
5. 100 grams Sun-dried Tomatoes
6. Handful Fresh Basil
7. A Handful of Cashew or Pine nuts
8. 2 Garlic Cloves
9. 5 tbsp Nutritional Yeast
10. Juice of a Lemon
11. Olive Oil
12. 2 tsp Chilli Flakes
13. Cherry Tomato optional

Method

1. Start by cooking the orzo as it says on the packet
2. Cook the sausages per the pack and once they are cooked cut them into little bite size pieces.
3. Now you can either chop up your mushrooms or blend them if you fancy a mince style texture and then put them aside.
4. To make the pesto, blend sun dried tomatoes, basil, nuts, lemon, oil, nutritional yeast, garlic and chilli flakes.
5. Heat up some oil in a pan and cook the chopped onion until transparent.
6. Next add mushrooms into the pan and let them release the water they hold. Once the mushrooms have darkened you can add the cut up sausages and the cherry tomatoes halved.
7. Finally, add your cooked Orzo and Pesto and stir it all in. Then serve with garlic bread or add some vegan cheese on top.

Let me know if you make this and I hope you enjoy.

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