Last week, I made chicken salad for one and extolled the virtues of taking your time on cooking for yourself. Enjoy the process, luxuriate in a nice bottle glass of wine, take care of yourself.
This week, I say: forget that!
Not really. But I’m trying to be realistic, too, and I know that the real challenge of cooking for yourself — and making something healthy and delicious — occurs when your schedule is hectic and harried. When you’ve worked all day, when you’re exhausted, when you just want to curl up and watch TV all night instead.
There is hope! Here’s one of my all-time favorite recipes, which also just so happens to be easy, and super fast!
The deconstructed couscous salad. I pseudo-invented this recipe, inspired by a similar salad from my number one very favorite local (and I do mean local) restaurant, The Cafe. Their version was Israeli couscous, tomatoes, basil, crispy corn, smoked salmon, toasted pumpkin seeds, currants & arugula. Fancy and delicious.
But incredibly easy to recreate with just about any ingredients you happen to have in your house. The basic formula I use is couscous + greens + chopped veggies + crunchy nuts/legumes + dried fruit (optional). I’ve sung the praises of Israeli couscous before, and always have it on hand for this recipe.
Here’s a step-by-step guide to putting the salad together (or apart) with the ingredients I use most commonly, so you can all see just how unbelievably fast and easy it is.
Step One: Get couscous started. Toast the desired amount of couscous (one serving is about 1/3 cup dry) in a little olive oil in a small pan for one or two minutes, stirring constantly. Add two parts broth (so 2/3 cup for one serving) and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer, stirring occasionally.
Step Two: Prep toasted nuts. (Feel free to skip and use pre-roasted or raw nuts, too!) I just throw a few handfuls of sliced almonds into a skillet with some salt, garlic powder and maybe a little paprika.
Step Three: Chop vegetables. I usually diced a few tomatoes, then toss them in some salt, pepper and balsamic vinaigrette. Microwave a little frozen corn or dice some bell peppers for something extra.
Step Four: Cheese. My deviation from the original! Because I can’t see tomatoes and basil and not want some nice, thick, slices of fresh mozzarella, too, I salt a few of these on a plate.
*Don’t forget the couscous in here!* It doesn’t need a lot of attention, just an occasional stir to make sure all the liquid hasn’t evaporated.
Step Five: Greens. Since you’re not cooking these, it’s best to do this step last, to avoid wilting. Here’s a fun culinary trick that will make you feel like a real chef: the chiffonade.
First, stack the leaves on top of each other like so.
Then, roll the stack as tightly as possible into a cigar.
Finally, slice across the cigar, allowing long, thin strip of basil to unfurl before your very eyes!
Step Six: Assemble. I like to be fancy in presenting something this simple and so I lay each ingredient out in a row across a plate, deconstructed.This also allows you to taste each delicious, fresh ingredient on its own…
Or mess the whole thing up!
And there you have it. A lovely, satisfying entree grain salad, all done in — top to bottom — less than 20 minutes. As I said, I typically make this meal with these ingredients, but the flavors are so easy to switch out. I’ve also made this with a combination of fresh spinach (which I sprinkle with a little red wine vinegar), sunflower seeds, dried cranberries and blue cheese, and with cherry tomatoes, fresh sliced asiago cheese, arugula (with just a bit of olive oil, mustard and black pepper), and leftover bacon crumbles. The couscous is a perfect backdrop — it carries flavor but doesn’t bring much of its own to the dish, so you can sprinkle whatever you want across it and create your own super-easy, healthy, and in most cases, vegetarian masterpiece from this slate.
