Sweet & Spicy Gluten-Free Moroccan Couscous

I feel like I talk about weather a lot, but it's kind of been running my life lately. Ottawa weather can be totally unpredictable with a windchill that will give exposed skin frostbite in under 10 minutes, wind that has blown over a double-decker bus and random days of 6-10 degree weather.

As citizens of the city, we all just go with it. I took part in a Winterman race last weekend, which began at 8am. Now, I understand why you would start a race in the spring or summer early in the morning - you don't want to risk heat stroke and the cooler weather is better for performance. But in -20 degrees, couldn't we wait for high noon, with an estimated peak high of -10? On this perfectly clear day with not a flake of snow in sight, the guy in front of me had a layer of white frost covering his entire head. It took me a moment to realize this was his sweat freezing through his tuque, and another to realize that I too had a layer of white just below my eyes - my sweat was doing the same. As I looked around at the other 1500 runners in the circuit, I laughed to myself in comic disbelief at how ridiculous we all were.

So, I'm leaning more toward the warmer ingredients these days- including ginger and curry. Apparently you can label your couscous "Moroccan" if it contains some mixture of curry, dried fruit and nuts. This is by no means authentic, and was made with leftover couscous I had from a tabouleh, so I didn't cook everything together like many couscous recipes call for. This version is more salad-like than anything, but made it a lot easier to throw together.

Sweet & Spicy Gluten-Free Moroccan Couscous   

Ingredients 

1 cup plain brown-rice couscous, cooked in vegetable broth
1/2 cup cooked brown lentils
1/4 cup chopped dried apricots
1/4 cup raisins
2 chopped scallions
1 tsp curry powder
1/2 cup steamed green beans, chopped into bite-sized pieces
A handful of fresh chopped parsley
1/4 cup sunflower seeds
1 clove garlic, crushed and minced
1/8 tsp cayenne pepper
1 1/2 tbsp olive oil
1 tsp fresh grated ginger
1 tbsp lemon juice
Salt and pepper, to taste

Directions 

Combine all ingredients in a bowl and mix together well. Option to heat and serve warm or cold. Let flavours set for at least 1 hr before serving.  Serves 4. Easy-peasy.

An Unconventional Snack: The Extraordinary Boiled Peanut

I had my first and only experience with this interesting take on a simple finger food at a restaurant here in Ottawa called Union. We had a team lunch there for my work, and as a southern-style kitchen, I knew not to expect more than a salad option- something I'm sure many of you can relate to. When they brought a little dish of these tasty morsels to our table while we waited, my eyes lit up. They were tender, salty and delicious.

I thought I knew the peanut. Raw, salted, unsalted, roasted, candied, shelled, in-shell, blended into butter- I love them in any form. Apparently this is a very popular snack in the Southern US, as well as India, Africa and Central and South America. Clearly, I am behind.

It did take me a while to try out this recipe, though. When I excitedly picked up a giant bag to take home and share my discovery with friends, I didn't realize that they take 3-4 hours of cooking. For a pre-meal snack? That would push dinner to after 9pm on a weekday. The bag was shoved into the back of my cupboard.

Then, a Sunday evening snack celebration was upon us: Superbowl Sunday. I finally got to try these out on my own. Maybe it was hard for the little guy to shine amidst the amazing homemade wings, ribs, doughnuts and cheesy bacon potato skins (my awesome friend veganized a few for me, oh yes she did) but to me, they were even better than I remembered.