Pine Nut & Lemon Orzo

It's picnic season! The grills are ready to go. Now you just need a side dish that is easy and delicious. Well here it is; Pine Nut & Lemon Orzo This is one of my all time favorite recipes. I make it several times a year. I am surprised I haven't written about it before today!

It is light & refreshing. It is full of flavor; lemon, parsley, roasted pine nuts. It is a very good accompaniment to just about anything you can grill, especially grilled chicken.

The recipe calls for ¾ cup of fresh lemon juice and 2 tablespoons fresh lemon zest. I find the lemon flavor to be quite powerful the day the dish is prepared. I try to make this dish a day ahead of time to allow the flavors to meld together. I have prepared this recipe cutting back on the lemon zest. But I didn't care for it with less lemon.

I like this recipe so much the way it is I don't play around with the flavors. I imagine it would be delicious with other herbs in addition to the parsley or eliminate the parsley all together and create your own flavor profile. You could also try using flavored olive oil. I also think adding feta would be delicious.

Give this recipe a try. Let me know what you think about the flavors. Also, let me know how you made the recipe your own. Enjoy!

Walnut and Rosemary Oven-Fried Chicken

Once again it has been several months since I last posted. I baked and cooked through the winter. But nothing new or worth posting about. I spent the month of April recovering from shoulder surgery and was unable to do much of anything. Now, in need of something new to eat and pretty sure I could do it, I decided to try a new recipe.

The recipe for Walnut and Rosemary Oven-Fried Chicken is from Cooking Light and the first time I ate this was at the office. Believe it or not, they served this in the cafeteria! That was several months ago. It has been at the top of my "need to make" recipe pile since. I'm glad I finally made it. It is just a delicious as I remember it.

The combination of panko, walnuts, and rosemary crisped up nicely when baked. The buttermilk and dijon mustard gave the chicken a nice flavor and it held the crumb mixture well. I was told if I didn't care for dijon mustard to cut the amount in half. I followed the recipe as written and found the dijon flavor quite nice. It took about 20-25 minutes to cook the chicken to 165ºF; longer then the 13 minutes provided in the recipe. As Chef Martha always said in class, "It's done, when it's done."

I plan on making this again and again!