People are very particular with what they put into their mouths and they should be. We don’t have to eat anything that isn’t delicious to us. However, I do smile on occasion when I see an adult avoid something because they think they don’t like it. I was having lunch with a friend who ordered chicken soup. Instead of rice or noodles, the soup had orzo in it. My friend went out of her way to avoid eating a single grain of orzo.
What amused me is that this same friend loves pasta and eats pasta in many shapes and sizes. She didn’t realize that orzo is pasta. It’s made with the exact same ingredients that pasta is made from; it’s just shaped to look like rice instead of spaghetti or ziti. My friend avoided something that she likes because it was in an unfamiliar form. She truly was judging a book by its cover.
Many people are in food ruts and won’t eat what isn’t familiar. There are two potential problems with this. First, any nutritionist will tell you that the more varied your diet the healthier you will be. Sticking to the same foods all the time is very limiting nutritionally. Second, there is a world of delicious tastes out there that you are depriving yourself of just because you think you don’t like something. You don’t truly know if you like it or not until you put some in your mouth and chew.
Orzo has many possibilities. It looks like rice, but it is indeed pasta. It makes an easy fast starch side dish. The simplest way to use it is to cook it in boiling, salted water until it’s the texture you prefer. Drain it and add butter and grated pecorino Romano cheese. If you want to make it a bit fancier, cut fresh Italian parsley into very small pieces and mix the parsley into the buttered orzo. It compliments any other dish beautifully.
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