Sunday, October 21, 2012

The Ultimate Winter Couscous


from Yotam Ottolenghi's Plenty
  • 2 medium carrots, peeled and cut into 3/4-inch chunks
  • 2 medium parsnips, peeled and cut into 3/4 inch chunks
  • 8 shallots
  • 2 cinnamon sticks
  • 4 star anise
  • 3 bay leaves
  • 5 tbsp olive oil
  • salt
  • 1/2 tsp ground ginger
  • 1/4 tsp ground tumeric
  • 1/4 tsp hot paprika
  • 1/2 tsp chile flakes
  • 2 1/2 cups cubed pumpkin or butternut squash (from a 10 oz squash)
  • 1/2 cup dried apricots, roughly chopped
  • 1 cup chickpeas (canned or freshly cooked) [I went with canned]
  • 1 1/2 cups chickpea cooking liquid and/or water
  • 1 cup couscous
  • large pinch saffron
  • 1 cup boiling vegetable stock
  • 3 tbsp butter, broken into pieces
  • 2 tbsp harissa
  • 1 oz preserved lemon, finely chopped
  • 2 cups cilantro leaves

Bake carrots, parsnips, shallots, spices, 4 tablespoons oil and 3/4 teaspoon salt at 375 degrees F for15 minutes.

Add, in my case, butternut squash.  This along with the parsnips and the milk from the mac and cheese were all bought at the Boston Local Food Festival I went to with Ori a few weekends ago.
Bake for another 35 minutes.

Add apricots and chickpeas and bake until hot.

Mise en place up until right before the last photo.

Prepare couscous and melt a lot of butter in.

Put vegetable mixture over couscous and cover it with a veritable carpet of cilantro leaves.  Additionally, harissa and preserved lemon are mixed into the vegetables after they have left the oven.
I actually really liked this dish without wondering where the meat was.
Apparently some lady complained to UK paper the Guardian (where Ottolenghi has a vegetarian column although he isn't one) that the dish had too many ingredients.  I find that somewhat laughable.  If a cook is ambitious enough this dish shouldn't be that out of reach.

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