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I have a question about couscous and do I have a fun and easy recipe for it. And - yes
I do! Couscous is so delicious. Um, this is what it looks like. It's incredibly easy to
cook. Um, many people think that it's a grain but actually it's like a very tiny pasta made
with semolina flour. And it's not a grain in and of itself. There's not a couscous plant
out there. So, it's actually madeÉit's tiny tiny tiny and because of that, it cooks incredibly
quickly. So you can buy couscous almost anywhere. Um, in large quantities, in boxes because
it comes flavored. Um, get it however you like it. Um, you can also buy it in whole
wheat form so that's another nice thing - which is also a quick cooking. So um the basic proportion
of couscous is to use about one to one. You'll want to check the package because occasionally
the, um, it may be because of the size of the couscous. The proportion will change slightly
but generally speaking it's going to be one cup couscous to every cup of liquid. So I'm
going to make a real quick recipe for you and show you how just amazingly fast this
is. So I'm starting with boiling water, um, you also could certainly use chicken broth
or vegetable broth if you want to add a little more flavor, it's a really good place to start.
But I'm just going to start with water to do a really simple one. To that, and this
was just boiling, to that I'm going to add a little bit of salt and pepper and in this
case I'm going to add a little curry which I think is a really great flavor with couscous
- it just give is a fabulous flavor. So I'm just adding curry powder, get you know the
kind that you like and then to keep it from being too dry add a little bit of some kind
of fat. I'm going to drizzle in a little olive oil. Probably for a cup, maybe two or three
teaspoons You certainly can use a little pad of butter in there which would be amazing.
So just kind of combine that. And to that, I'm also going to add a few raisins. You can
use currents, you can use finely chopped apricots, that would be amazing in something like this.
I think dried fruit and couscous is a beautiful combination. Um, it has a little Moroccan
feel to it, it's so good. So now I've got my boiling water with my seasoning and my
raisins and all I'm going to do is add the couscous. So I've got about a cup of water
and about a cup of couscous, pour that in, I'm going to just blend that up, and you'll
notice I am not on the stove here because this had just been boiling as I mentioned.
So, um, I don't need to cook this anymore. I'm covering it and I'm going to let that
sit for about 5 minutes and the couscous will be done. It's as easy as that. Um, you can
flavor it in so many ways. There's a million things you can put in. You can add some green
onions to this, I could skip the curry and add some herbs to it - fresh or dried, um
lemon is a really nice thing with couscous. So I could add some grated lemon peel, a little
lemon juice, um, flavor it however you like. I could turn this, I could add some chicken,
some shredded chicken into this or shrimp and make it into a main dish. All kinds of
things. It's an amazing little, as I said, I call it tiny tiny pasta. But it's really
really great. It cooks so quickly. So in just a couple of minutes this is going to be done.
I will have a really flavorful, delicious side dish. So, buy some couscous and give
it a try.