One pan cooking

I think everyone should have at least one one-pan cooking up their sleeves, I absolutely love this kind of cooking and can’t sing enough praises. It saves on space on the counter, no juggling with various pans on the hob and obviously much less to wash up. Depending on who’s in for dinner, I have cooked traybakes, savoury baked rice dishes and this latest orzo-to style number, which happens to be completely vegetarian, give or take on the final garnish. I tested it on a Scottish friend who stayed with us recently and inspired her to get the ingredients for it. So I had better get on with writing the recipe, just for Pam.

I really love this recipe, for the simplicity and celebrating a few storecupboard ingredients. If you can, use the queen chickpeas in this recipe as they really add the extra special-ness to the dish. Ordinary tinned chickpeas will do just fine otherwise.

700g queen chickpeas (I used my favourite, from Bold Bean Company)
300g orzo pasta
1 vegetable stock cube
1 teaspoon picked fresh thyme leaves
1 small onion, peeled and chopped
2 garlic cloves, peeled and finely chopped
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
1/2 teapsoon sweet smoked paprika
1/2 teaspoon dried chilli flakes, optional
1 cauliflower, broken into florets*
A small handful of flat leaf parsley
20g pecans, roasted
1 unwaxed lemon, zested and juiced
A little feta, broken over as a garnish, optional

• Preheat the oven to 190c. Roast the pecans for about 7 -10 minutes, be careful that they don’t burn. Remove and set aside to cool.
• Meanwhile line a baking tray with greaseproof paper, add the cauliflower florets, season with olive oil, salt and pepper, mix through.
• In a wide shallow casserole pan (mine is 30cm wide, cast iron Le Creuset), put in the chopped onion, garlic, thyme leaves, mix through the ground cumin, sweet smoked paprika and dried chilli flakes, if using. Now add the orzo pasta, queen chickpeas and the cooking liquid. Next dissolve the stock cube in 700ml of water, add that into the pan. Stir to mix well and bring everything to a boil, turn off the heat. Cover and put it in the hot oven. Place the cauliflower on a separate rack and cook for 30 minutes.
• When the time is up, check the cauliflower is tender but not too soft and mushy. Remove from the oven to cool.
• Now check also the pasta is cooked as it may need just a little longer, the orzo should be al dente (soft but still with a bite). The cooking liquid should be absorbed into the chickpeas and pasta and they may appear googy and soft – this is a good thing! Remove from the oven.
• Rough chop the parsley and pecans and mix with the lemon juice and zest. Stir this through the cooled cauliflower and Scatter this mixture on top of the cooked orzo and chickpea, finally crumble over some feta, if using, before serving. (in the photo, I actually cut some blush oranges and added to the topping. So you see, use what you have and make it your own.)