Mediterranean Couscous Salad

This salad is great for entertaining and makes fantastic leftovers (this is perfect to pop in a Tupperware container and take to work). It’s easy to prepare in advance, it is food safe and lasts a while (aka it would not make anyone sick while sitting on a buffet table on a rooftop patio for a few hours), works well as a vegetarian option and is also was lower cost item. Oh and of course it’s delicious. I consider this salad one of those “use up anything in your fridge/ pantry” types of salads so get creative! You can swap out the chickpeas for other beans you have on hand, add avocado, corn or different herbs. It’s hard to make this salad not taste good. Be warned that the serving size here is quite large so cut the portion in ½ or ¼ depending on how many leftovers you want.

Mediterranean Couscous Salad

Prep time: 20 minutes
Cook time: 5 minutes
Total time: 25 minutes
Yield: 8 as a meal, 16 as a side

INGREDIENTS

For the Couscous Salad

• 1.5 cups uncooked couscous

• 1 orange bell pepper, diced

• 1(19oz/540ml) can chickpeas, drained and rinsed

• ½ cup pitted and sliced Kalamata olives

• ½ bunch parsley, finely chopped

• ½ bunch cilantro, finely chopped

• zest ½ lime

• zest of 1 lemon

• 1 bunch of green onions, chopped

• 200 g crumbled feta

• 300 g cherry tomatoes *cut these in half if serving right away, leave whole if you are serving the salad later

• 1 English cucumber, chopped *I also do not like adding this in unless I am serving it right away, I find that the cucumber gets soggy over time
  
  

For the Dressing

• 2/3 cup extra virgin olive oil

• Juice of 2 lemons

• Juice of 1 lime

• 1 clove garlic

• 2 teaspoons Dijon mustard

• ¼ teaspoon ground coriander

• ¼ teaspoon cumin

• ¼ teaspoon oregano

• ½ teaspoon granulated sugar

• Salt and pepper to taste

DIRECTIONS

Cook the couscous according to package directions. Transfer to a large mixing bowl, let cool and then add in all remaining salad ingredients, omitting the cucumber if you are wanting to refrigerate and serve later. Blend all ingredients for the dressing in a food processor or with an immersion blender. If you don’t have either of these tools you can whisk this by hand, just make sure the garlic is very finely minced. Pour the dressing over the salad and serve! Don’t be averse to making this salad ahead of time because the longer it sits in the fridge the better it tastes.