Fiddle of Nirasha's Orzo Salad

Every morning I start with some kind of fruit (this morning a tangerine), Shredded Wheat n' Bran cereal with 1% milk and hot tea with a little milk. I'm adding a glass of water to breakfast as well. I like a tablespoon full of raisins on my cereal. You may or may not want to waste the points on this.

I also made another GREAT discovery: two of my most favorite crackers, Finn Crisp and Ry Krisp, are both ZERO points! If you eat a lot of them they will start to have points, but two are zero! On none-dieting days I eat them with butter, but today I ate them with tomato slices sprinkled with a pinch of salt as a mid-morning snack.

I have yogurt as well for a mid-morning snack. And I'm keeping radishes, celery and cucumbers for munching on whenever. And I alternate between plain water and sparkling water with a lime or lemon in it.

Just found out 1/4 of a cup of barbecue sauce is only 1 point*, so I'm going to work on a pulled pork sandwich with bbq sauce. I always make my own pulled pork from a pork shoulder and then refrigerate it so all the fat is solid and can easily be removed. I'll type that soon. If you don't have the time to make an entire pork shoulder than you can just make the bbq sandwich with a pork chop. But I'm going to do the pork shoulder so I can use the leftovers to make posole. I may try to do this in the slow cooker since everyone is always asking me for slow cooker recipes.

But right now I'll share one of the most popular recipes from The Maili Files: Nirasha's Orzo Salad. I only had to make slight modifications in this recipe. I reduced the oil to saute the onion and omitted the pine nuts. The dressing was already just lemon juice. If you want to reduce the points further you can omit the feta cheese or use a low-fat feta cheese, but having the cheese in there makes it more filling and also counts as a serving of dairy for the day!

I keep feeling like I'm giving myself the best gift from eating this way!

Fiddle of Nirasha's Orzo Salad

1 one-pound box of Orzo

1 yellow onion

pinch of salt for onion

extra water to caramelize onion

2 tablespoons olive oil

1 7-0unce bag of argula (or more)

2 cups grape tomatoes (or cherry tomatoes)

cut in half

1/2 cup crumbled feta cheese

2 tablespoons capers

1 13.75 ounce can artichoke hearts packed in water

cut in half or fourths

1/4 cup fresh lemon juice

other additions: fresh parsley, basil or mint

Kosher salt and pepper to taste

1. Put a large pot of salted water on the stove to boil. (I always use Kosher salt.) Cook orzo for 9 minutes until al dente. Rinse orzo in cold water until completely cool before adding other ingredients.

2. While the orzo is cooking, saute a yellow onion over medium heat in the olive oil. Sprinkle it with a pinch of salt while cooking. When it starts to brown add 1/3 cup of water and let it cook until the water is gone. Add water again and let it cook down until onions are completely soft and caramelized. Can take 10 to 20 minutes. Pour onions over the cooked orzo in a large mixing bowl.

3. Toss in arugula, tomatoes, feta cheese or parmesan cheese, capers, artichoke hearts, lemon juice, kosher salt and freshly ground pepper. Mix to combine.

Makes 16 1-cup servings. Each cup is only 4 points* or 180 calories. Each serving has two grams of fiber and 7 grams of protein. If you would like to make this salad larger without changing the points add more arugula.

*The Points® values for these products and/or recipes were calculated by Maili and are not an endorsement or approval of the product, recipe or its manufacturer or developer by Weight Watchers International, Inc., the owner of the Points® registered trademark.