Use Your Booty: Orzo with Arugula and Chive Blossoms

This is another non-recipe recipe, but that's the way market meals tend to go, isn't it?

We ate this dish hot, like a pasta main course, but it would be pretty great at room temperature as a pasta salad too. Don't skimp on the chive blossoms: they're pretty and they taste great!

Orzo with Arugula and Chive Blossoms

Serves four as an entrée and six as a side dish

• 1 pound orzo pasta (substitute another small pasta shape if you can't find orzo)
• 2 bunches arugula, rabe, chard, mizuna, spinach (after the leaves are stripped off the stems you should have 6-8 cups of loosely packed leaves - I used some finely chopped Swiss chard stems too - those are the reddish bits you see)
• a dozen chive blossoms (or 1/4 cup of mined chives)
• 1/4 ounce parmesan cheese, finely grated
• high quality extra virgin olive oil

Strip the greens leaves from their stems and then chop the leaves. In a large skillet over medium-high heat, sauté the greens in a little olive oil until they are wilted and softened - about 5 minutes or so. Turn off the heat.

Meanwhile, boil the pasta in plenty of salted water until it's cooked to your preferred doneness. before draining the pasta, reserve about a cup of cooking water.

In the skillet, combine the drained pasta, the parmesan cheese and enough pasta water to sauce things up. Stir in the chive blossoms and taste for salt and pepper. Drizzle some olive oil over the top of the pasta and serve.

This Summer, I am chronicling my first CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) experience. My CSA share is from Arrowhead Farm, a farm based in Newburyport, MA. Each week, I am posting about what was in my share and what I'm doing with it. By way of full disclosure, I won my share through a raffle and am not paying for it. However, Arrowhead did not know I was entered in the raffle, and I received no special consideration because of this blog.