Roasted Vegetables with Couscous

Couscous is such a wonderful ingredient; its light and airy.  It also makes for an excellent palette for the melding of flavors and binds the many parts of the dish together. I've made this salad with roasted vegetables, as roasting given them that extra bit of punch, and I love a bit of charing around the edges. This salad is simple enough and requires little attention, as its just a matter of prepping the vegetables and leaving them to roast in the oven. I've also added some Hungarian smoked sausage, as it adds a different texture and some smokiness, but you can use any bacon or chorizo as a substitute, or omit it altogether for a vegetarian version.

Ingredients

• 4-5 thin slices of smoked Hungarian sausage, quartered
• 1/2 red onion, roughly chopped
• 1 carrot, roughly chopped
• 1 aubergine, cut into thick cubes
• 1/2 zucchini, cut into thick match-sticks
• 2-3 florets of cauliflower, split along the stem
• 3 pickled gerkins, roughly chopped
• 1/2 cup uncooked couscous
• 1 cup low sodium chicken stock
• 1 tsp dry rosemary
• 1 tbsp olive oil
• juice of 1/2 a lemon
• salt and pepper to taste

Method

1. Pre-heat the oven to 200C/gas mark 6.
2. Add the sausage, onion, carrot, aubergine and cauliflower in a roasting pan. Add the oil and rosemary and toss around to get the oil to evenly coat the vegetables. Sprinkle on some salt and pepper. Add a little extra salt as it'll make the vegetables a little bit crisper and will be balanced out by the couscous.
3. Place the roasting tin in the oven and leave it in there for 40 minutes. Turn once at 20 minutes, but otherwise leave it alone.
4. Heat the chicken stock till it starts boiling. Add the boiling stock to the couscous, cover and leave aside.
5. Once the couscous has cooked, add the gerkins.
6. Once the roastings done, remove from the oven, add the couscous to the mix and toss the mixture around.
7. Leave it covered for a minute, as it will allow the couscous to absorb the roasting juices.
8. Plate up, add a splash of the lemon juice and serve up.