I have recently been doing a lot of “shove anything in” recipes for both evening meals and lunches, using up ingredients from the cupboard and fridge and trying out various flavours. This is one that I came up with that I’ve really been enjoying and is really versatile. I’ve been having this Cous-Cous salad (with the odd tweak) for about 4 weeks now and I still look forward to it every lunch time! I usually bulk make these on an evening (literally takes 10 minutes) for the following 2/3 days at a time for the 2 of us. This is perfect for anyone working at home or taking a lunch to work that is looking for something quick and inexpensive to put together, but that is still healthy, filling and tasty.

The base of the salad is always cous-cous, cucumber, mint and feta (although next week I am going to swap the mint and feta for basil & mozzarella and have a more Italian themed salad!). Then I add in various herbs/spices for taste, and cut up any other salad bits I have in the fridge that would otherwise go to waste.

Recipe (makes 4 lunches);

Boil a kettle and add 250ml of the boiled water to a jug or large bowl. Weigh out 200g of cous-cous and add this to the boiled water, covering the jug/bowl, and leaving for at least 10 minutes. The cous-cous will soak up all the water and become light and fluffy. Stir a fork through the cous-cous to break it all up and add in 1 tbsp of butter.

Whilst the cous-cous is cooling down, cut up your salad and add all of this to a large mixing bowl. Here’s an example of what I have been adding;

• 1/2 cucumber, halved and seeds scraped out, then diced
• Handful of fresh mint, chopped finely
• 1/2 block of feta, diced
• 100g cherry tomatoes or sun-dried tomatoes, halved or quartered
• Handful of radishes, thinly sliced
• Handful of olives, halved
• 100g mangetout/sugarsnap peas, chopped

Once the cous-cous has cooled, add this to the mixing bowl and give everything a really good mix up. Then add a tsp paprika and a tsp of garlic powder, with a decent pinch of both salt & pepper for some lovely flavour. You could try different spices at this point, I tried the Moroccan Spice mix “Ras El Hanout” this week and it was so tasty.

Once all mixed together, separate into 4 re-usable boxes. Then top with a meat of your choice if you wish. I have been using chorizo slices or cooked chicken, you have so many options with this meal!

I hope that I have given you a bit of lunch-time inspiration. Please let me know what ingredients you have tried and enjoyed 🙂

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Happy munching 🙂

Jen

@jensfoodblog

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