This recipe is sponsored by DeLallo.
Roasty tomatoes, creamy parmesan orzo, and some meatballs if you want, all laced with a little bit of garlic butter. This is silky, luscious, and dangerously easy to eat. One bowl becomes two bowls becomes three… it’s so good. Plus, the whole thing gets mixed and baked all in one dish, which is the only way I want to live from here on out.
In This Post: Everything You Need For Creamy Baked Orzo
- Take Me To The Baked Orzo Recipe
- Lindsay’s Notes
- How To Make This Creamy Baked Orzo
- Video
- FAQs
- Reviews
Lindsay’s Notes
This is the definition of a weeknight hero! It’s comforting, cozy, and ridiculously easy to make.
Pour everything in a pan, bake it in the oven, and be rewarded with a creamy baked orzo that is full of simple, nostalgic flavor. It has a Spaghetti-O’s vibe in the most delicious way – a little extra starchy with the baked-all-together texture, plus rocking that comforting taste of store-bought tomato soup. And with all the coziness, the addition of fresh garlic, butter, Parmesan, and fresh basil gives it the perfect amount of lift.
I actually love this meal without any meatballs at all – the first time I made it, I just had the roasty tomatoes, the creamy tomato orzo, and the parmesan, garlic, butter, and basil finishers. It was SO good, I practically ate half the pan by myself.
But if you are looking to add some protein, meatballs are a good choice – and my first recommendation, of course, would be the baked chicken meatballs. I’ve also had good luck with just throwing a bag of store bough frozen meatballs right in there, although you might not even need the whole bag – usually half a bag, or a few meatballs per person, is good enough for us.
How To Make This Creamy Baked Orzo
Step 1: Pour Orzo Directly Into a 9×13 Pan.
Yes, directly in there!
We use DeLallo orzo – all their pasta is top-notch, imported from Italy, with the best texture. It’s bronze cut, which means each individual piece has a bit more texture that can hold onto all that saucy goodness.
Step 2: Add Stuff Right in There.
This is the beauty of this recipe. Just pour it all in! We’re adding:
- Chicken or vegetable broth
- Tomato soup
- Halved cherry tomatoes
- Meatballs if you want
Step 3: Mix and Bake.
Give it a little stir and transfer that guy to the oven. Everything will happen right in the pan!
Step 4: Add Your “Finishers” for Flavor and Beauty.
All is fair game! I like to add:
- Fresh grated garlic
- Butter
- Parmesan
- Fresh basil
Watch How To Make This Creamy Baked Orzo
Creamy Baked Orzo with Meatballs
- Total Time: 45 minutes
- Yield: 6–8 servings 1x
Description
Chewy little pasta bites with a nostalgic-feeling tomato base and bits of garlic butter peeking through. Parm sprinkle, basil leaves, and you’re good to go!
Ingredients
- 16 ounces DeLallo orzo
- 3 cups vegetable or chicken broth
- 2 cups ready-to-serve tomato soup (like this one)
- 2–3 cups premade chicken meatballs (store-bought frozen or homemade)
- 1 pint cherry tomatoes, halved
- 1/2 cup Parmesan cheese
- 1 clove garlic
- 2 tablespoons butter
- fresh basil for topping
- DeLallo Private Reserve Olive Oil for topping
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 425 degrees. Pour the orzo, vegetable broth, tomato soup, meatballs, and tomatoes into a 9×13 baking dish. Stir to get everything coated and combined.
- Bake for 25 minutes. Give it a little stir and check the texture. If needed, bake for another 10 minutes to let the orzo finish absorbing the liquid. Fluff up the orzo with a fork and stir in any remaining liquid that might be bubbling around the edges. This will gently break down the tomatoes and release some of their juices as well. (As the orzo sits, it will continue to absorb liquid so add more tomato soup or broth as desired.)
- Add the Parmesan, garlic, and butter; stir to melt it in. Top with fresh basil leaves, olive oil, salt, and pepper.
- Prep Time: 10 minutes
- Cook Time: 35 minutes
- Category: Pasta
- Method: Bake
- Cuisine: Italian
Keywords: baked orzo, orzo recipe, orzo and meatballs
Frequently Asked Questions For Creamy Baked Orzo
Jarred tomato sauce would be a great stand-in and give it more of a true spaghetti taste and feel.
Throwing a can of chickpeas in would be perfect!
Yes! The chickpea alternative would be the way to go.
Use gluten-free orzo and dairy-free butter and parmesan. You would also want to make sure that your tomato soup is a gluten-free and/or dairy-free variety.
Yes! I would boil the orzo (cook to al dente) and then drain it off. Blister your tomatoes in a skillet until they’re bursty, add the orzo, and build a sauce with a combination of broth, tomato soup, butter, garlic, and parmesan.
3 More Pasta Recipes My Family Loves!
Thanks to DeLallo for sponsoring this recipe!
Please cook your orzo before following this recipe! I had to take my pan out of the oven, separate the meatballs and orzo, and scoop the orzo into a skillet with water and cook it thoroughly because the pasta was not cooking in the oven with this method. Also please make sure to season your food!! I used salt, pepper, garlic powder, and Italian seasoning. I also used jarred tomato sauce instead of tomato soup.
This is one of our family favorites. We’ve made it so many times! We’ve recently realized we need to switch to gf pasta, so I’ll try that for the first time and see how it goes.
Some other reviews it’s flavorless – I would disagree, my family, neighbors and friends that we’ve shared it with love it!
This recipe is such a hit! It’s fast and comforting. Not sure why it’s not working for others in the comments. My recommendation is to really scrape the bits off the bottom when you pull it out after 25 minutes of cooking. Then in the last ten minutes everything will be well distributed to absorb the remaining liquid. I used TJ’s tomato and roasted red pepper soup and homemade chicken meatballs. Added a few shakes of crushed red pepper and Italian seasoning. It’s so yum with a side salad!
I used ground chicken in this instead of meatballs, and Trader Joe’s tomato and roasted red pepper soup in the carton, but otherwise followed the recipe exactly. It was precisely what I wanted on a cold winter evening. Topped with extra cheese at the end for more comfort! I would make again when that easy casserole craving hits. No issue with the orzo cooking, I did use a metal spatula at the 25 minute mark to scrape from the bottom and make sure everything was mixed well.
This creamy baked orzo with meatballs looks absolutely delicious! I love how comforting it seems, perfect for a cozy dinner. Can’t wait to try this recipe and impress my family! Thank you for sharing!
I made this with some creamy carrot soup I had as left overs along with beef meatballs and bone broth very delightful and simple!
I have never left a comment on a recipe before. I use this website a lot and there are a lot of good things on it. This is not one of them. It is flavorless and I helped it along so much. I added garlic and shallots, added salt, pepper, red pepper, and Italian seasoning. I added a lot of butter and a healthy squeeze of lemon. It is still bland. You need way more liquid than the recipe says. If you are going to make it, I would use half the amount of orzo it says so that the orzo actually cooks in the amount of liquid in the recipe. Also know that you’re going to need to add a lot more spices. We have a ton of it left over and I’m not sure what we are going to do with it. Just really disappointed by this one.
Making this tomorrow
Do i bake the chicken meatballs first or do they bake in the sauce with orzo and tomatoes?
Meatballs should be baked first! You can make your own or get the frozen pre-made ones from the store. 🙂
So I usually love the pinch of yum recipes. The as-is written recipe is a really good base for a great orzo bake. However, some additional instructions may be necessary to get that creamy pasta that everyone loves.
Pan prep: Grease the pan with butter or oil on all sides.
Note: if adding additional vegetables, only add one because when I added a zucchini it ended up almost overflowing my dish.
1. Mix all the liquids together first before adding solid ingredients. (Add seasonings such as 1 tsp thyme, 1 tsp oregano, 1 tsp smoked paprika, 0.5 tsp cumin. Pepper to taste.) I suggest also adding an additional shallot. If you’re feeling fancy, fry the garlic and shallot in olive oil until aromatic. If you are cooking zucchini like I did, then it would be nice to give it a nice fry as well. I did not, so my zucchini was unevenly baked at the end of this recipe.
2. Put aluminum foil on the pan for the first 20 minutes. Remove the aluminum foil in the last 10 minutes of baking.
3. Every 10 minutes stir the pasta in the dish.
4. When removing the dish out of the oven, put the aluminum foil back onto the dish to rest for 15 minutes. I saw this help even out the moisture and homogenize the cooking within the bake. At the end of the resting period, my zucchini was a bit more soft to my liking.
So easy and tasty! But the orzo majorly stuck to the bottom of the pan. I’m wondering if I sprayed the pan first if that would help? I might try making it in a Dutch oven next time and stir more frequently to see if that helps. I thought the flavor was great!
Unfortunately this recipe wasn’t that great. It was fine but won’t make again. I did like the simplicity of the recipe though.
Unfortunately this recipe wasn’t great, I should have heeded the other reviews. Thankfully I halved the recipe. It was fine, just pretty bland. I did like the easiness of the recipe though.
Made this for dinner this week and it was delish and so easy. As many others have commented, I used the TJ’s tomated & roasted red pepper soup. Our basil plant was in a sad space so I used dried basil that I added before cooking, along with a few shakes of oregano and parsley. I added all 3 of these spices to the linked home-made meatball recipe as well.
Note: it doesn’t say to grease the dish but my gut told me do this- so glad I did I think it would have stuck pretty badly otherwise.
Note 2: I didn’t add the butter and it was still super rich and creamy. I’m sure it would have been even better with this.
This was delicious! I used homemade meatballs and shallow fried them in oil before adding the rest of ingredients and oven baking. I just excluded the butter since the oil was already added. My whole family loved it, I’ll definitely be making it again!
I just wanted to come here and say that it was delicious! I don’t know why there’s so many bad comments. The texture and taste was really good!
I bought everything for this recipe and then when I was reading through the reviews I got worried about the flavor comments. Happy to report that adding 1/2 tbsp of Italian seasoning and 1 small white gave lots of flavor to this dish. We also used fresh basil from our garden and were very happy with how it turned out! Lastly, I will note- we did need the extra 10 minutes of baking time, bringing oven time to 35 minutes and stopping to stir at 25 minutes.
So simple and fast yet so delicious! The perfect weeknight meal
I disagree with the comments that said this recipe doesn’t work as written— I used the water and soup proportions and the orzo cooked and absorbed the liquid perfectly. I used TJs tomato and red pepper soup, which tasted delicious. Definitely think the flavors will depend on how tasty your broth and soup are! Next time I will add more veggies. I subbed oil-packed sundried tomatoes for the cherry tomatoes and they were delicious. Super easy recipe with very few dishes to do after!!
So easy. Didn’t have basil on hand so I used a large spoonful of pesto. Used the chicken freezer meatballs from POY (that I always make sure to have in the freezer) and they worked well. A very comforting meal. Reheats well adding a little extra tomato soup. Will definitely put on the reg rotation.
Loved this! I halved this recipe and put it in an 8×8 baking dish since I was only cooking for two. I followed the recipe and directions almost exactly, including stirring at 25 mins and baking for another 10 mins. I oiled my baking dish ahead of time. I added the salt, pepper, garlic, and a pinch of Italian seasoning and fresh parsley I had on hand before baking. The fresh basil on top afterwards really kicked it up a notch! So so unbelievably easy and quick. Will definitely be making again!
So easy! Followed the recipe and a suggestion from another user to stir halfway through. I definitely needed the extra 10 mins – so a total cook time of 35 mins. Delicious! Thank you!
I thought this was really good! Very easy and cozy. My orzo stuck to the glass pan, so next time I’ll make sure to spray the pan first. The flavor depends a lot on which tomato soup you buy, so it could turn out differently if you get a weird soup. The garlic and basil at the end are crucial. Maybe add some more seasoning if you like a bit more “oomf.” It reminds me a lot of the baked penne & meatball dish on the site. That recipe is one of my all time favorites.
I made this last night and it was decent and incredibly easy! I made this with Delallo whole wheat orzo, Pacific creamy tomato soup, premade chicken meatballs from the refrigerated section and good parmesan. I added the garlic at the beginning of the cooking process because I do not like raw garlic which worked well. I felt as though the dish needed a little extra flavor so I added garlic powder after it had cooked and quite a bit of salt. I did not have any issues with the pasta cooking although I added 5 minutes extra because the pasta was too al dente for my liking. It was quite tasty and I am excited to eat my leftovers but this wasn’t the normal standout recipe from POY that I am used to– I felt as though the flavors could have been amped up a bit.
Made this last night and both my husband and son praised it. In addition it uses frozen meatballs (and I put them in frozen and they came out fine) which I always seem to have hanging around in my freezer to make a SUPER QUICK comfy weeknight dinner. Or for when you don’t feel like cooking, which happens often with me, haha! Thanks Pinch of Yum!
Made this tonight and ended up throwing it all out. It came out gummy and certainly lacked flavour. On top of that it look over an hour to cook by the time the pasta was actually cooked. Save your money and pass on this one.