CousCous Pilaf
Serves 4 as a side dish
CousCous is a traditional food of North Africa.
It is actually a teeny tiny little pasta.
CousCous is very light and can be prepared in a variety of ways.
In this recipe using a mixture of sauteed and blanched vegetables it is wonderful as a light meal or as part of a meal.
Ingredients:
- 150 gr or ¾ cups whole wheat cous cous
- 300 ml or 1 1/4 cups water
- 1/8 tsp sea salt
- Olive oil
- ½ medium carrot in 1 cm cubes
- 1 cob sweet corn,
- carefully cut corn off the cob
- 125 gr or ½ cup small broccoli cut in florettes
- 60 gr or ¼ cup pitted kalamata olives
- White part of 1 leek, cut in 1cm pieces
- ½ yellow bell pepper, cut in 1 cm squares
- ½ TBLS ume vinegar
- ½ TBLS shoyu
- Small bunch of fresh mint leaves (Wash, dry, remove stems, and chop mint leaves)
or peppermint essential oil (dilute 1 drop peppermint essential oil with 1 Tbls of olive oil now use ¼ tsp of this mixture to flavour the dish)
Instructions:
- On medium high flame bring water, sea salt and 1/2 TBLS olive oil to boil in a small size sauce pan with lid.
- When boiling, stir with a wooden spoon and pour in the cous cous simultaneously.
- Cover and reduce heat to low flame, simmer for 3-4 min, turn flame off and let stand for another 5 min before fluffing with a fork and removing to a bowl.
- Wash vegetables in cold water.
- Bring about 250 ml or 1 cup water to boil in a small sauce pan.
- Blanch the carrot, broccoli and sweet corn all separately, each for about 2 minutes, removing each with a skimmer or a slotted spoon to a plate.
- On medium high flame heat sauté pan, add 1 TBLS olive oil and first sauté the bell pepper and after 2 minutes add the leek.
- Sauté another few minutes and then add the shoyu, stir briefly, and remove from heat.
- Cut olives in round slices.
- Combine sauteed vegetables, blanched drained vegetables, olives and fresh mint or peppermint essential oil to the cous cous.
- Add the ume vinegar, stir and serve.