Spicy Vegetable Couscous

Submitted by mersaydees

"This is based on a recipe from Glamour's Gourmet On the Run cookbook, by Jane Kirby. I love this dish served with whole-wheat pita bread and Moroccan mint tea (you'll find several recipes for this tea on 'Zaar)."

 

• Ready In: 1hr
• Ingredients: 17
• Serves: 4

ingredients

• VEGETABLES

• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 medium onion, coarsely chopped
• 1 garlic clove, minced
• 1⁄2 medium turnip, diced (2 cups)
• 2 carrots, diagonally sliced
• 1 (8 ounce) can tomatoes, drained
• 1⁄2 teaspoon salt
• 1⁄2 teaspoon ground cumin
• 1⁄4 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
• 1 cup chicken broth
• 1 small zucchini, sliced
• 1⁄2 cup garbanzo beans (canned chick-peas)

• COUSCOUS

• 1 1⁄2 cups chicken broth
• 4 tablespoons butter
• 1 cup couscous
• fresh cilantro (to garnish) or parsley sprig (to garnish)
• sesame seeds, for garnish

directions

1. Heat oil in large skillet over medium-high heat.
2. Add onion and garlic to pan, and saute until tender but not brown.
3. Add turnip, carrots, tomatoes, salt, cumin, crushed red pepper and chicken broth.
4. Turn heat up to high and bring to a boil.
5. Reduce heat to low; cover and simmer 10 minutes or until vegetables are tender yet firm when tested a fork.
6. Add zucchini and garbanzo beans; cook until zucchini is just tender.

7. Meanwhile, prepare couscous:

8. In a large saucepan, heat chicken broth and butter.
9. Add couscous.
10. Cover and remove from heat.
11. Let stand 15 minutes.
12. To serve, spoon some couscous on a warm plate; top with vegetables and their broth.
13. Garnish with cilantro or parsley and sesame seeds.

Reviews

[jessi_mcg]

Oh, I enjoyed this! I was looking for a nice veg dish to enjoy while the rest of the family had a meat entrée, and I think I got the better meal! It was very easy to prepare, and I imagine there is room for experimentation in terms of which veggies are used. I am not a fan of turnips, so I added some eggplant and green beans I had languishing in the crisper. Turned out great! I will use that method for prepping grains in the future; the butter and broth added terrific flavor. I cut this recipe in half this evening to serve just me and my toddler son, and boy do I wish I had made a whole recipe as leftovers would be sublime! Next time I might add more pepper flakes, but I might have been a bit ginger with them because of my little guy. Made for ZWT 9, by a fellow Gourmet Goddess.

 

[Sydney Mike]

Well, this recipe (with it's cicken broth) isn't really one that anyone could call a vegetarian delight, but I tweaked it a little & we were very, very satisfied with it ~ I replaced the chicken broth with the homemade vegetable broth that I usually have on hand, & that worked well! With the exception of the turnip (easy enough to purchase), I had all the ingredients in my kitchen, so . . . Thanks for sharing a great recipe with us! [Recipenapped & made in the Vegetarian/Vegan Recipe Swap 23]

 

[I'mPat]

I scaled back for 2 serves and found that plenty for 3 of us, I did not use turnip and rather than use on 1/4 can of tomatoes I chopped up a large ripe tomato and made up the vegies in the morning and used heated up in the microwave when making the couscous making it for an exceptionally quick side to go with dinner. Thank you mersaydees, made for Make My Recipe tag game.