Orzo and Black Bean Salad

It’s spring, and I’m so sad. Spring in Houston means highs in the 80s, and the ever-present reality that Summer is Coming. As we march forward toward the blisteringly hot, humid summer, I find that I always become increasingly invested in light meals that don’t feel heavy even though they’re super filling. Pasta salads really fill some of that niche for me, and I tend to crave different pasta or other grain salads throughout the spring.

I used a homemade mayo as the dressing, thinned down a bit with some extra lemon juice to brighten it up just that much more, but you can totally sub in store bought mayonnaise with no ill effect whatsoever. You’ll just toss some herbs and lemon juice (and maybe a little mustard) into the jarred mayo you scoop out! You also can pick a different pasta, or a different bean, or a different anything, really, if what I’ve used isn’t to your tastes. Make it your own! And if/when you do make it your own, would you let us know in the comments what happened so we can enjoy your delicious salads as well? I’d be very excited to get some new pasta salads from y’all!

Here’s what you’ll need

For the salad:

1 pound orzo, cooked to package directions
1 can black beans, rinsed, or about 1 3/4 cups of beans you cooked from dry
1/2 cup chopped palm hearts (olives work well here, ditto pickles, or basically any other briny food)
1 carrot, chopped
1 red bell pepper, chopped
1 small green apple, cored and chopped (you can peel it if you like, but I like to leave the peel on)
salt and pepper to taste
1 recipe dressing (less if you prefer a drier salad)

For the dressing:

1 egg yolk
1-2 teaspoons Dijon mustard (this gives a strong mustard flavour, so if you'd like it weaker, use less)
2 teaspoons each: lemon juice, white wine vinegar
1 teaspoon garlic juice, or 1-2 cloves garlic smashed into paste (you could use one of those tubes of garlic paste, too, if you keep that handy)
1/2 tablespoon salt
3/4 cup olive oil
1/2 cup each: chopped cilantro, chopped basil (I used Thai, but you use what you want) For dry herbs instead of fresh, use 2-ish tablespoons per herb
extra lemon juice to taste (I used about 2 tablespoons)

Here’s what you’ll do

For the dressing:

Whisk together the egg, mustard, lemon juice, white wine vinegar, garlic and salt until well combined. A few drops at a time, whisking constantly, add the oil until you've gotten a third to half of it in. Then whisk in the remainder of the oil in a thin stream, also whisking constantly. Whisk a few more minutes until it starts to thicken. The mayonnaise will still seem very thin compared to grocery store mayonnaise, but you will still be able to tell it’s properly mayo and not just still trying to get there. Let sit 5 minutes, then whisk in the herbs and chill. Once chilled, whisk in more lemon juice to 1/3 of the mayonnaise (since that’s what you need for the salad). Ross likes this dressing as a sandwich spread, if you like sandwich spreads, since you’ll have leftover mayo.

For the salad:

Combine the orzo, beans, carrot, bell pepper, palm hearts and apple. Add the lemon-thinned mayonnaise that had been portioned out, and stir well to combine. If you want the salad wetter/creamier, add more mayonnaise in 1-2 tablespoon increments until it has the desired level of wetness. Add salt and pepper to taste. Serves around 8 as an appetizer or 4 for a meal.