I love giant (also known as
Israeli) couscous – it genuinely makes things interesting, unlike regular
couscous which can like a bit of a cop-out unless it is done properly. It is
readily available, and I tend to use the Merchant Gourmet brand, because they
stock it in my local supermarket and it comes in both regular and whole-wheat –
I use whole-wheat.
This salad is fantastic – fresh,
sweet and sour, kind of like the big brother of my favourite fruity couscous
recipe here. I found it on the brilliant foodie website Epicurious, and
I fell in love with the recipe because it includes the instructions for how to
scale it up to 50 portions. And this definitely is a good recipe for
mass-catering, or potlucks. The original recipe can be seen here.
Serves 4-6
200g giant (Israeli) couscous
1 small butternut squash (or half a
large one) peeled and diced into cubes no bigger than 1 inch
1 tsp cumin seeds
Olive oil
2 preserved lemons
Handful pine nuts or flaked almonds
(or both) toasted until golden brown
Handful golden raisins or sultanas
Half a bunch of fresh parsley –
washed and roughly chopped
Salt and freshly ground black
pepper
Preheat the oven to 200 degrees
centigrade.
Rinse
the lemons and halve them. Scoop out flesh, keeping both flesh and peel. Cut the
peel into smallish dice. Put lemon flesh in a sieve over a bowl and squash with
back of a spoon to extract the juice.
Toss
the squash with 1 tbsp oil, cumin seeds and salt in a large oven tray and
spread in 1 layer. Roast for 30 – 45 minutes, or until it is tender and browned
in parts.
While
the squash is roasting, cook couscous in a large pot of boiling water according
to package instructions, and drain in a colander (do not rinse).
Empty
the couscous into a large bowl and add the rest of the ingredients, plus the
juice reserved from the lemons, the roasted squash (plus any tray-scrapings)
and another tablespoon of olive oil. Season with salt and freshly ground black
pepper to taste.
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