Tags
affordable lunch, Butternut Squash Cous Cous, butternut squash recipe, cheap and easy recipes, cheap lunch, cut butternut squash, healthy food, house and garden magazine
I don’t know about you but lately I’ve been getting pretty lazy when it comes to preparing a lunch for myself. Throughout the winter months I managed to survive on spending relatively little by buying soup and splitting it between two days (thank you Tesco finest) however it’s Spring now and I want to be a bit more adventurous with what I eat without dipping into the bank balance too much!
Therefore I decided I would try and make something nutritious, delicious and cheap that would last me a few days and hopefully I wouldn’t get too bored of. I’ve really been enjoying butternut squash lately, especially since Craig made an incredible butternut squash and chorizo soup (I’ll have to put the recipe up here!) so I wanted to make something with it in and thought about making a cous cous dish.
After searching a few different websites I came across this one from house and garden magazine recipes section:http://www.houseandgarden.co.uk/recipes/main-courses/giant-couscous-butternut-squash – I have now fallen in love with this recipes page, mostly because I just love looking at the food styling but also because the recipes really are so varied and use a wide range of ingredients. This recipe in particular didn’t seem too hard to make and although butternut squash can be a tad expensive, the recipe creates 4 servings so you make good use of it. Here is what you need to make butternut squash cous cous:
INGREDIENTS
- 1 lemon
- 750g (1½lb) butternut squash (I just used 1 butternut squash which was plenty)
- 3tbsp olive oil
- 1 large onion, chopped (changed for a red onion)
- 1 clove garlic, crushed
- 250g (8oz) giant couscous (used normal cous cous as Sainsburys didn’t have the big stuff)
- 1 cinnamon stick
- Grated zest of 1/2 lemon
- 1/2 long red chilli, chopped (didn’t use but would recommend)
- 20g (¾oz) fresh flat-leaf parsley, chopped (didn’t use as Craig packed spinach into my bag instead of parsley so that’s my excuse)
- 4tbsp mint leaves, chopped
- 2 little gem lettuces, shredded
- 100g (3½oz) pine nuts, toasted
- 60g (2oz) golden raisins (I used 2 small bags of mixed raisins, nuts and pumpkin seeds which worked really well instead)
- 1/4tsp ground allspice
- vegetable stock
