Bag Lunch: Orzo Salad

I gleaned most of my cooking skills from logging hours of watching the Food Network. This recipe came from an episode of Everyday Italian I watched in college, and it is so reliably delicious that I still make it, more than five years later.

I modified things a bit to work with what I had, so there was no mint in my salad, I added chicken, and used a store-bought balsamic vinaigrette. But, if you have the time, I definitely recommend making the red wine vinaigrette that's part of the recipe. There was just something missing from my salad without the zing of the red wine vinegar.

Since I ate this salad all week, I kept a large container of the orzo, chickpeas, onion, and chicken in the fridge and each day added tomatoes, basil, and dressing to the portion I planned to eat for lunch. Cut tomatoes get mealy fast, chopped basil and mint will turn brown after a while, and dressing will make orzo (or any pasta, for that matter) soggy when it sits too long, so either eat this salad right away or keep the delicate ingredients separate!

Here's the salad looking much more attractive in the natural light. My kitchen makes everything a sickly yellow.