Creamy Boursin orzo bake with Italian sausage and artichokes
- Preparation 15 min
- Cooking 30 min
- Servings 4 to 6
- Freezing Not recommended
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🍝 One pan, dry orzo, thirty minutes in the oven
Nothing gets boiled ahead here. The orzo goes into the dish dry, the broth goes in cold, and the oven does the rest. That is the part people don’t believe until they try it. You slice the sausages, dump everything in a big baking dish, cover it with foil, and thirty minutes later you pull out a pan of pasta that tastes like it took a lot longer than it did. One dish to wash. That is the whole reason this one stuck around at my place.
🧀 The Boursin goes in whole. Do not smash it
Push the orzo aside, make a well in the middle, and drop the whole puck of Boursin garlic and herb in there. Leave it alone. Under the foil it melts from the outside in and perfumes the broth around it instead of disappearing into it right away. When the foil comes off you stir once and the whole thing turns into sauce. Smash it at the start and you lose that.
🌿 Artichokes and cherry tomatoes, not another chicken version
Most Boursin orzo bakes out there run on chicken or chicken sausage. Mine goes Italian: sausages baked whole first so the fat drips off, marinated artichoke hearts for that briny, oily edge, cherry tomatoes that collapse into the broth, and a handful of spinach thrown in at the start so it wilts down to nothing. The white wine and chicken broth do something water never will. Mild sausages if there are kids at the table, hot ones if there aren’t.
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🌭 Bake the sausages whole before you slice them
This is the step people skip and then wonder why the pan is greasy. Whole sausages on a sheet pan for 15 to 20 minutes means the fat drips onto the pan instead of into your orzo, the outside browns, and the meat firms up enough to slice into clean coins instead of squashing. Raw sausage stirred straight into the orzo gives you slick broth and a spongy texture. Not what we are after.
💧 Three cups of broth to a pound of orzo. That ratio is the recipe
Orzo drinks whatever you give it. Three cups (750 ml) of broth to 1 lb (454 g) of dry orzo, covered, at 375 °F (190 °C), lands at tender with a bit of bite in about 30 minutes. Check it at 25. More liquid than that and you get porridge, less and the bottom scorches before the top cooks. If it looks dry when you stir at the halfway mark, add hot broth, never cold water.
🧀 Leave the puck alone
Whole, center of the dish, uncrushed. It melts slowly under the foil and the garlic and herb goes into the broth around it, then one stir at the end turns everything creamy. Crumble it in at the start and it just dissolves.
🌶️ Mild, hot, or fennel
Mild Italian sausage keeps everyone happy, hot ones are what I reach for when it is adults only, and fennel sausage pushes the whole thing further into Mediterranean territory. Two mild and two hot in the same pan is a good compromise. If sausage is your thing, my air fryer sausages work for the pre-cook step too, and I use the same marinated artichokes in my spaghettini with artichokes and cherry tomatoes.
♻️ Leftovers need liquid, not more heat
Cold orzo keeps absorbing overnight and comes out of the fridge as a brick. A skillet over medium with 2 to 3 tbsp (30 to 45 ml) of hot broth, stirred gently for 3 or 4 minutes, brings it right back. Covered in a 350 °F (175 °C) oven with a splash of broth works for a big batch. Microwave it dry and you will be sorry.
🍽️ What to serve with it
It is a full dinner on its own, so what it wants alongside is acid, not more richness. A sharp green salad does it: my white balsamic arugula salad is the one I make most often with this. If you want to stretch it into a proper Italian dinner, start with my orzo salad with bocconcini and pesto, and if you liked what Boursin did here, it does the same trick in my Boursin pasta with roasted cherry tomatoes.
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Ingredients
- 1 lb (454 g) orzo
- 4 Italian sausages, baked whole then sliced
- 1 small onion, finely chopped
- 2 garlic cloves, finely minced
- 1 jar (12 oz / 340 ml) artichoke hearts in oil, roughly chopped
- 1 ½ cups (375 ml) cherry tomatoes, about 10 oz (280 g)
- 1 cup (250 ml) fresh spinach, packed
- 1 large package Boursin garlic and herb, 8.8 oz (250 g)
- ¼ cup (60 ml) white wine
- 1 tbsp (15 ml) Italian seasoning
- 3 cups (750 ml) chicken broth
- Olive oil
- Salt and freshly ground pepper, to taste
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Preparation
- Preheat the oven to 375 °F (190 °C). Lay the Italian sausages whole on a sheet pan and bake them 15 to 20 minutes, then pull them out, let them cool enough to handle and cut them into coins.
- In a large oven-safe baking dish, about 9 x 13 inches (33 x 23 cm), combine the dry orzo, the sliced sausages, the onion, the garlic, the cherry tomatoes, the artichokes, the spinach, the white wine, the Italian seasoning and the broth. Season with salt and pepper, then stir so everything sits in an even layer.
- Push the orzo aside to make a well in the center and set the whole package of Boursin in it, uncrushed. Drizzle olive oil generously over the top, then cover the dish tightly with foil.
- Bake about 30 minutes, until the orzo is tender and almost all the liquid is gone. Halfway through, stir the orzo around the Boursin without breaking the puck, then cover again and return it to the oven.
- Take the dish out, pull off the foil and stir until the Boursin disappears into a sauce. Crush the cherry tomatoes against the side of the dish to release their juice. Splash in a little hot broth if it looks tight. Taste, adjust the salt and pepper, and serve straight from the dish.
Dry orzo, broth, sausage and vegetables all go into a large baking dish at once. Whole Boursin in a well in the center, olive oil on top, foil on tight, 375 °F (190 °C) for about 30 minutes. Stir once at the halfway mark without breaking the cheese. The orzo is never boiled first and the dish is never uncovered until the end, because the trapped steam is what cooks the pasta.
I have only made it with Italian sausage, so I can’t promise you a timing that works. If you go that way, the safe move is to brown bite-sized chicken pieces first, the same way I bake the sausages before slicing them, then add them with everything else. Raw chicken dropped straight into the orzo means checking that it hits 165 °F (74 °C) at the same moment the pasta is tender, and those two clocks rarely line up. The sausage version is the one I stand behind.
It is a rich pasta dinner and I am not going to pretend otherwise. That said, there is no cream in it: the sauce is Boursin melted into broth, and one package spreads across four to six servings. The artichokes, cherry tomatoes and spinach carry real weight in the pan. If you want it lighter, use mild turkey Italian sausage and serve smaller portions next to a big green salad.
Something acidic and green. A white balsamic arugula salad is my default, because the vinegar cuts the melted cheese in a way bread never does. Garlic bread is fine if you have people over, but you do not need starch next to a pan of pasta. A cold Soave or a wheat beer does more for it than a side dish would.
Boursin shallot and chive or Boursin cracked black pepper swap in without changing anything else. Without Boursin at all, the closest thing is cream cheese with 2 grated garlic cloves, 1 tsp (5 ml) of Italian herbs and a good pinch of salt stirred in. Creamy goat cheese also works and gives you a tangier bake. None of them melt quite as smoothly as the real thing, which is why I keep buying it.
With my Boursin orzo bake with Italian sausage and artichokes, the Inama Soave Classico is the right kind of quiet. Garganega grown in the Veneto, all white flowers and green almond, it lifts the melted Boursin instead of wrestling with it, and the mineral finish wipes the palate clean after every bite of sausage. An Italian white for an Italian bake. Serve it cold, around 8 °C (46 °F).
See the productWith my Boursin orzo bake with Italian sausage and artichokes, the Blanche de Charlevoix does what a squeeze of lemon would. Soft wheat, coriander and orange peel slice straight through the melted Boursin, and the fine carbonation resets the palate between forkfuls of sausage. It never fights the artichokes either, which is more than most beers manage. Serve it cold, in a wide glass.
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