Church Lunch 21/12
Three salads
- Chickpea and herb
- Risoni Salad with Tomato, Basil & Rocket
- Roast Pumpkin with Green Beans and Basalmic Dressing
I spent a frustrating morning trying to find the recipe I had made some months ago with chorizo and capsicum baked in Pedro Ximenez, but couldn’t find it. I’m going for this recipe with the sweet Muscato instead of red wine vinegar fort tonight for Kate.
The salads from Hildegard’s baptism were
http://www.taste.com.au/recipes/669/pumpkin+and+chickpea+salad
Couscous salad for leftover roast meat from number 4 in this Guardian post (in this case I did roast pork leg especially for it)
This has to be one of my favourite lunchbox salads – it is pretty forgiving and will last well for a couple of days in the fridge. It works with just about every roast meat, but on this occasion I used roast chicken.
Serves 4
Ingredients:
220g instant couscous
about 350ml hot vegetable (or chicken) stock
zest and juice of 1 fresh lemon
salad
1 can of chickpeas, rinsed and drained
100g baby plum or cherry tomatoes, quartered
½ red pepper, chopped
10cm piece of cucumber, deseeded and chopped
3 spring onions, finely chopped
25g dried fruit, such as apricots and dried cherries, finely chopped
1 tbsp fresh coriander, finely chopped
1 tsp fresh mint, finely chopped
olive oil
salt and freshly ground black pepper
200g roast chicken, torn into strips
Prepare the couscous by putting the dry couscous in a medium-sized bowl and adding the hot stock, lemon zest and lemon juice. Stir well. Cover with a clean tea towel and set aside, to allow the couscous to absorb the stock. This will take about 15 to 20 minutes.
Add the drained chickpeas, chopped tomatoes, red pepper, cucumber, spring onions, dried fruit and chopped herbs. Stir well to combine.
Add a little olive oil if the couscous seems too dry.
Check the seasoning (you probably won’t need much salt if the stock has been salted).
Top with the strips of roast lamb and a generous dollop of hummus.
Sprinkle a little of the smoked paprika over the hummus and serve.
Tips: Sprinkle over a little diced feta or Wensleydale cheese, instead of the roast chicken.
Any leftover roast meat will work very well, especially chicken or beef.
Smoked fish is also good with couscous, especially smoked mackerel.
Delicious with a dollop of houmous and a sprinkling of smoked paprika.
For future reference, other salads and meals for Church in the past have included:
Quinoa salad with Jamie Oliver’s best roast leg of lamb.
Cauliflower korma – with the frozen khorma paste which basically has garlic through cloves
Chilli and prosciutto cauliflower (don’t remember)
Penne, pesto, ricotta and green beans (OK but not great from memory)
Roast pumpkin and garlic soup (awesome)