Spicy Couscous with potatoes and nuts (bateta couscous)

It was Sunday morning and I wanted to make a quick and easy brunch. I often make bateta pawa for brunch but thought I would use the same recipe but use couscous instead of pawa (flaked rice). I got introduced to couscous by my son. He told me that he often takes a mixture of couscous and boiled vegetables for his lunch when he is at Uni but finds it quite bland so we tried this recipe and managed to come up with ideas to spice up his lunch too!!

Ingredients for 4 servings: 

1 medium sized potato diced
¼ cup sweetcorn (I used tinned sweetcorn)
1 grated onion
handful of almonds and peanuts
2-3 chopped green chillies
1 cup of couscous
1 tsp salt
½ turmeric
1-2 tbl lemon juice
1 tsp sugar (optional)
2 tablespoons cooking oil
1 teaspoon mustard seeds or cumin seeds
A few curry leaves, coriander and chilly powder for garnishing (optional)

 Method 

1. Heat the oil in a saucepan and add mustard seeds to it.

2. Once the popping stops, add the onions, green chillies, nuts and stir.

3. Add the salt, turmeric and sugar.

4. Cook the onions for a couple of minutes.

5. Now add the diced potatoes and sweetcorn and cook this until the potatoes soften. This should take about 5-7 minutes.

6. Whilst the potatoes are cooking, soak the couscous in room temperature water. For one cup of couscous, you will need two cups of water. The water will get absorbed by the couscous and within two minutes - the couscous will swell up and look cooked.

 7. Once the potatoes are cooked, add the couscous to the mixture. Using a large pronged fork, lightly mix in the couscous so that it fluffs up and blends in and takes the flavour of the spices in the potatoes and sweetcorn.

8. Add the lemon juice, sugar, coriander and curry leaves and allow the mixture to cook on a low heat for a couple of minutes. If it looks too dry, just add a couple of tablespoons of water to it. 

9. Sprinkle some chilly powder to the spicy couscous and serve it hot with plain yogurt.

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