Spicy Orzo Jambalaya
in a crockpot!
I’ve never been a huge crockpot user. I love the idea of making dinner in the morning and having it ready by dinner time, but I just haven’t found too many recipes that ‘wow’ me from a crockpot, and hardly any ones worth repeating. This recipe, however, is an exception. I’ve been making a version of it for years, and if you ask my husband what is one of his favorite dinners that I make?…he will tell you it’s my orzo jambalaya! I think it brings him back to our early years in marriage.
The key to making this spicy is the Tabasco sauce. I’ve also made a version that uses a few canned chipotle peppers in adobo sauce, but I prefer the spiciness from Tabasco sauce because it lingers, and that, in my opinion, is what sets this dish apart from any other jambalaya. I use orzo pasta instead of rice, and I like to use sausage and shrimp in mine. Other people also add chicken, but for me, three proteins in one dish sounds like a bit too much. If you have 1 or 2 stalks of celery, that would also be a good addition to what I listed out in the recipe below.
I wish I could say this recipe serves at least 4 people, but it usually only feeds my husband and I with only one bowl of leftovers. I know it hard to imagine that with a pound of shrimp and 4-5 sausages, but I’m telling you, it’s hard not to go back for seconds!
I hope you enjoy my crockpot jambalaya! You don’t get too many crockpot recipes from me!
Ingredients:
4-5 sausage links, coined
1 onion, diced
1 green bell pepper, largely chopped
1 yellow bell pepper, largely chopped
2-4 garlic cloves, minced
1 14.5oz can diced tomatoes
1 tsp pink salt
1/2 tsp pepper
1 tsp dried basil
1 tsp dried oregano
1 Tbsp sugar (I use a monk fruit sweetener instead)
1 - 3 tsp Tabasco sauce (depending on how spicy you like your food)
1/2 cup orzo
1 lb raw shrimp, thawed and peeled
Instructions:
Add sausage, onion, yellow and green bell peppers, garlic, diced tomatoes, salt, pepper, basil, oregano, sugar, and tabasco sauce into the crockpot. Stir until everything is well mixed.
Cook on low setting for 6 hours.
30 minutes before dinner, stir in the orzo pasta, and bump up the crockpot setting to high.
10 minutes before dinner, stir in the shrimp and cook until the shrimp is pink and cooked completely through.
