Colorful Garlic Orzo

Recipe By Jenny Wadkins
Rating
Published May 15th
Prep 15m Cook 25m Additional - Ready In 40m
Servings 6 servings Calories 484.2

This dish is fast, easy, colorful, healthy, and delicious! Don’t skip the chicken broth; it adds essential flavor to the dish. I like mine extra garlicky and go for the full 6 cloves, but it’s plenty flavorful with less. You can use just about any veggies or meat in this recipe and it will still be great. I use all frozen veggies so I only need to shop for tomatoes, and even those I could use canned if I feel lazy, making this a true from-the-pantry meal with no shopping required.

Recipe Ingredients

  • 4 cups chicken broth
  • 2 cups orzo pasta
  • 1 ½ pounds lean ground turkey
  • 4 cloves garlic, minced, or more to taste
  • ½ teaspoon red pepper flakes, or more to taste
  • 4 cups fresh spinach leaves
  • 4 cups frozen broccoli florets
  • 1 pint cherry tomatoes
  • ⅓ cup frozen peas
  • ⅓ cup frozen carrots
  • salt and ground black pepper to taste

Cooking Directions

  1. 1 Bring chicken broth to a boil. Cook orzo in the boiling broth, stirring occasionally, until cooked through but firm to the bite, about 8 to 10 minutes. Remove from heat; do not drain.
  2. 2 Heat a large skillet over medium-high heat; cook and stir turkey in the hot skillet until crumbly and evenly browned, about 10 minutes. Stir garlic and red pepper flakes into turkey; cook for 1 minute. Reduce heat to medium. Add spinach, broccoli, tomatoes, peas, carrots, orzo, and broth to the turkey mixture and cook, stirring often, until spinach is wilted and tomatoes begin to split, 5 to 10 minutes. Season with salt and black pepper.

Nutrition Facts

  • Calories 484.2
  • Carbohydrate 62.9 g
  • Cholesterol 87.2 mg
  • Fat 10.5 g
  • Fiber 7.4 g
  • Protein 37.3 g
  • Saturated Fat 2.6 g
  • Sodium 782 mg
  • Sugar 6.6 g

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Chef's Notes

I usually use a heaping 1/2 teaspoon of the red pepper flakes. This dish is very light but the garlic and red pepper flakes give it tons of flavor!

Reviews

  1. Charlotte Pendragon Apr 16, 2021 07:05 AM
    I made this because I was searching for a good healthy recipe using chopped veggies, orzo and ground turkey vigor my husband who is recovering from oral surgery. It is a HIT! We both LOVE IT! This dish will become a regular go to meal now in our house hold. I made a few changes - Read more ...
  2. Wade & Angela Chancellor Sep 11, 2018 05:44 AM
    It was pretty good but what made it was putting a fried egg on top of our serving. I won't make it again.
  3. fawniz Jan 30, 2018 05:12 AM
    I made this to have our family try something different....WE ALL LOVED IT!! We used fresh not frozen....Switched out carrots & peas for yellow squash & zucchini....I sautéed all the veggies (except spinach) w/a little bit of extra virgin olive oil kosher salt & pepper before I put them in. my hubby & picky 18 - Read more ...
  4. sweatintotheoldies Feb 4, 2016 02:44 AM
    So good! Made this tonight for my fella to try something different. Just added extra garlic and only used the ground turkey regular tomatoes black olives a little olive oil broccoli and a good amount of salt and pepper. Definitely a hit and will be great cold for lunch!
  5. cooking jack Jun 25, 2015 01:12 AM
    Everyone loved it. I used fresh shredded carrots & broccoli. The table added soy sauce and hit-sweet sauce making it Oriental!
  6. BW Williams Jul 21, 2014 09:33 PM
    Easy to make I even added a bit of Feta Cheese!
  7. Robin Whitworth Oct 15, 2013 02:46 AM
    I tried this recipe as written. Even though I use quality turkey the end result was a "bleh" taste with a unpalatable texture. I think this recipe would do better without meat or perhaps leftover chicken rather than ground. I'm going to keep this recipe and give it a tweak with zucchini and some onion - Read more ...
  8. oh2cook Mar 26, 2013 10:03 PM
    Used all veggies as recipe called but unfortunately cut the garlic in half. Found it better with added garlic salt. Will learn next time to keep garlic as indicated or even more. Didn't have cherry tomatoes so used 2 whole tomatoes cut up. Also added 1 tablespoon of chopped fresh cilantro white pepper & a - Read more ...
  9. cookingstar-la Jan 19, 2013 08:49 AM
    love this recipe! easy to substitute vegetables or pasta for your taste! I reduced ground meat to 1 pd and added 1 pd mushrooms which gave a more earthy flavor reduced sodium by using 2 cups broth and 1 1/2 cup water same great flavor!
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