A delicious flavour combination: couscous with dried apricots and butternut squash. Simple and healthy but fabulous Ottolenghi cous cous recipe from the first Ottolenghi cookbook. Perfect for packed lunches, picnics and parties.
Brace yourselves! After weeks of squeaking in the comments of other peoples blogs “I’ve just bought the Ottolenghi book but so far only made the macarons,” I can honestly say I have made up for this by cooking no less than SIX recipes from this wonderful book in one week. I won’t post them all in succession but starting with this colourful Ottolenghi cous cous recipe do expect to see them all over the next few weeks.
I even recruited a new member to the Ottolenghi Sista-hood (hello Deeba, Jamie, Meeta etc etc!). Fast forward a few days and we were tweeting what we were cooking from the book that weekend and bizarrely ended up choosing to cook two identical dishes at the same time. If we ever meet, we’ll probably be wearing the same t-shirt.
This Ottolenghi cous cous recipe can be prepared in around half an hour. It is lovely eaten warm but equally good cold – it got me off the hook making my husband’s sandwiches the next day and his colleagues at work were apparently very interested in what he was eating, so much so that one of them came round for dinner – an Ottolenghi supper of course.
The next Ottolenghi book, “Plenty“, is due out later this month. Can it live up to the first one? I think so, I think we’re going to see a series of successful books from this team as we did from River Cafe and Moro in the 90s and 00s. You’d best stock up on pomegranate molasses now!
Couscous with dried apricots and butternut squash
A blend of delicious flavours and textures in this versatile couscous salad using butternut squash and apricots.
Servings: 4
Calories: 574kcal
Ingredients
- 1 large onion thinly sliced
- 6 tbsp olive oil
- 50 g dried apricots
- 1 small butternut squash about 450g peeled, seeded and cut into 2cm dice
- 250 g cous cous
- 1 vegetable bouillon cube
- 400 ml water boiling, from kettle
- 1 pinch saffron dried strands
- 3 tbsp fresh tarragon roughly chopped
- 3 tbsp fresh mint roughly chopped
- 3 tbsp fresh parsley roughly chopped
- 1 1/2 tsp cinnamon ground
- grated zest of half a lemon
- salt to season
- pepper to season
Instructions
- The original recipe text is available in Ottolenghi The Cookbook.
- Take a look at other Ottolenghi recipes previously featured on this site.
Notes
Optional - I also sprinkled over some pumpkin seeds which were not part of the original recipe. You can see these in the photo.
Depending whether you're eating this as a packed lunch dish or a side salad, you might stretch it to six portions instead.
What else can I make with couscous
I have published several other couscous recipes including tomato couscous, one pot chicken couscous with olives and garlic mushroom couscous. I also served couscous alongside these IKEA style veggie balls.
Wow this looks great I’m going to make it soon. I’m not sure if you did a similar recipe of this with chicken thighs in, which I’ve made a few times.
Yes the chicken couscous recipe is a good one, I think this is the link to the one you mean.
I need to use the butternut squash that's been festering in my fridge, knew there was an Ottolenghi recipe but can't find my Ottolenghi book under the piles of papers on my table, so Googled 'butterbut squash Ottolenghi' and guess what came up on search results?
At least we're cooking in a good fortnight apart this time, it was getting a bit weird!
@valen, @tasteofbeirut Great to see you here, I hope you enjoy the forthcoming Ottolenghi recipes I will be featuring
@gourmetchick Really? Can't wait to hear about that!
@marymoh you should give it a go and good luck next time!
@jamie once you get started with them, you can't stop, the savoury recipes are really easy
@grubworm Your ideas sound very tasty too
@sandra @su-yin I think you'd get your money's worth out of it
@cristie I hadn't put butternut squash in cous cous before, it's wonderful
@ramblingtart Thanks!
@deerbaby At least he's making dinner, mine next does but he always washes up
@mozart's girl Welcome! I love Sandra and Morwenna!
@sari Do it!
@heavenlyhousewife Only about 2-3 weeks to go!
@meetak Yes we're becoming quite a crowd now
@diva You are lucky to be near enough to go there easily… I might not have bought the book if that was the case!
@oohfood I didn't know they were in the guardian? Will have to look on their website as I don't buy papers very often. Hope your Easter party goes well.
@bethany You would love it I'm sure. Perfect with your other favourite, hummus.