Roasted butternut and beetroot salad with couscous

Last weekend I was invited to supper with friends. That's not unusual what is, is Dr M. Having just ended a sabbatical, is back at work and commuting between the village and Cape Town and when he's home, catching up with "his" people is critical to his replenishment. He loves doing it at home, but none of likes going empty handed - and many of us enjoy cooking and entertaining as much as they do. So, this exchange is not unusual:

Then, the day before:

The pressure was on! Partly because, well, a green salad can be well, just boring and, honestly, Dr M is a good, creative cook, himself, including of salads. His husband is vegetarian - not a challenge for me - rather an opportunity to dream up something that would include a protein for him. That he's not fussy and likes food and flavours, too, makes it much more fun.

Anyway, I prefer doing seasonal ingredients and sometimes that's easier said than done, especially between seasons, so I chose to do a salad that could, sort of, be considered warm, rather than cold.

I also figured I've done my usual rocket (arugala) and beet salad (about which I thought I had posted, but have not), to death in the last year or so.

I did, in my HivePUD post, mention, spring, salad leaves from the garden and this salad. I didn't say, but thought at the time, that I might share the recipe.

I did say that I had such fun dreaming up this side dish: it was also enough of a hit - especially with Vegetarian W, that when we were both - at short notice - invited to another Saturday braai, and with the same request, I had to consider what ingredients I had available. There would not be time for me to shop.

I blurted, "Should I do the salad I did last week?"

"Yes, please!" was the unanimous response.

Again, the pressure was on: could I replicate, exactly, the salad I'd made the week before - the combination of leaves and the vinaigrette?

Here's what I did:

In my air fryer (yes, I'm a convert: a story for another time), I roasted the beetroot in their skins and set aside to cool. Then, the butternut with a little olive oil, salt and cumin seeds. Halfway through, I added slivers of onion to start caramelising. After the butternut was cooked, I separated it from the onion and removed the tray and then returned the onions to the air fryer and tossed them in the little olive oil and cumin seeds that had fallen through and finished them off.

At the same time, I made a vinaigrette and prepared some couscous.

About the vinaigrette —

Recipes for vinaigrette are two-a-penny on the interweb. I never use one: I've been making my own version(s) of what my mother called a French dressing since I was about 10. That's more than 50 years. That said, because of my more recent venture into recipe creation doing things, ahem, the right way, I did some research and found that one of the rules of vinaigrette is the ratio of (olive) oil to acid (vinegar, lemon juice/verjuice, etc) is 2:1. The - and quantities of - the rest of the ingredients is personal preference. I usually add salt and pepper, some sugar or honey and mustard. I prefer using my homemade wholegrain mustard, and which I recently made for the first time in, well, it feels like almost forever. For this particular salad, I also added a bruised clove of garlic and a sprig of tarragon.

I knew that there would be a couple of hours before we'd be eating supper so there would be time for the flavours to develop: don't make a vinaigrette two minutes before you dress and eat the salad. It really does neither the salad nor the dressing, justice.

The couscous

I use the quick couscous and after seasoning it, I added the onions that I'd caramelised with the butternut and cumin seeds, as well as the residual oil and seeds that had collected in the bottom of the air fryer. Use your judgement and, if necessary, add a little more olive oil and adjust the seasoning. Once cooled, stir through some freshly chopped coriander (cilantro).

Assemblage

The piéce de resistance: assembling the dish.

But first, about those leaves

The leaves were not just lettuce, or a selection of different lettuces, but included sweet rocket (arugula), coriander (cilantro) and mint. Only the coriander was not from the garden...

I used a large, round platter and turned the couscous out into the centre of that and before anything else, I distributed the leaves around that heap.

Because I hate how beetroot "contaminates", only butternut went on to the couscous with the beetroot on the leaves around the edges.

Because I took the salad to dinner (as it were...hahaha!), I kept the feta and dressing separate, and to add at the last minute. With the feta*, you have a complete meal. On one platter.

*substitute with nuts and / or seeds (preferably roasted with a little salt) for a vegan option

It was a hit which explains the request to rinse and repeat, a week later. Although I had said that I'd make it again, I was a little anxious about being able to replicate it perfectly - and get the same results - from the dish and the diners.

This time round - just last evening - instead of assembling the salad before leaving home, and because we were all going somewhere else to watch the rugby, I put the ingredients into separate containers so that I could put the pieces of the puzzle together closer to dinner time.

It was a winner. Again. Mission accomplished.

Until next time
Fiona
The Sandbag House
McGregor, South Africa

Photo: Selma

Post script

I blog here, on Instagram and via WordPress to my own website. I write for love and a living and you'll find out more about that here. Content for the first two, and sometimes the last, cross pollinate

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