Grilled Quail with Couscous

My local supermarket's started keeping quail, and it felt like a good day to try something a little more gamey. Quail's an interesting meat, and is quite lean. It like chicken, but a lot softer in texture and with a slightly sweeter taste. It's especially popular around Ramzan, where its lathered in a thick ginger-onion marinade and deep fried whole. In this recipe, I've grilled the quail with sumac, rosemary and thyme and served it with a fruity couscous and a light vinaigrette. To help with the grilling, I had the quails halved and spread out, but you can get them spatchcocked/butterflied as well.

Ingredients

Quail

• 2 quails, halved and 
• 1 tsp dried thyme
• 1 tsp sumac
• 1 tsp dried rosemary
• 2 tbsp olive oil
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tsp pepper

Couscous

• 1/2 cup instant couscous
• 1/2 cup boiling water
• 1 tsp salt
• 3 walnuts, chopped
• 3 almonds, chopped
• 6 raisins, chopped
• 1 tbsp chopped mint

Vinaigrette

• 1/2 purple onion, finely diced
• 1 tbsp mint, chopped
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tsp paprika
• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 1 tbsp sherry vinegar
• 1 tsp pepper

Method

1. Mix the quail ingredients together to create a marinade, add it to the quail pieces, and leave aside to marinate for at least 2 hour, and preferably overnight.
2. For the couscous, add dissolve the salt in the water, mix the other couscous ingredients together and add the salted boiling water. Cover and leave aside for 7-8 minutes.
3. Mix the vinaigrette ingredients together and store in the fridge until use.
4. Once ready to grill, heat a grill pan or a barbecue on medium, and baste the grooves with oil.
5. Once heated, pour the marinade over the quail one last time, then place each piece on the grill.
6. Cook on each side for 4 minutes, until the quail pieces are cooked through. Take off the grill and let it rest for 2-3 minutes.
7. To assemble, make a bed of the couscous and place two halves of the quail on top. Pour the vinaigrette over and serve up.

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. 

Mustard Crusted Tuna with Spiced Couscous

Its tuna season, at least in Bangalore it is, and there were some wonderfully fresh specimens at the store. I love the feel of tuna, its skin has this leathery quality and the entire fish glistens in the light. I also decided to filet it at home, which with tuna is such a painful task as it has these little pin bones throughout. I served it up with a yellow mustard crust and some saffron infused couscous. The mustard adds a bitter crust, so if you're not serving it with the couscous, choose something a little sweet to cut through the bitterness.

Ingredients

Tuna

• 2 skin-on filets of tuna
• 1 1/2 tsp yellow mustard seeds
• 1 tsp paprika
• 4 peppercorns
• 1 tbsp olive oil
• salt to taste

Couscous

• 1/2 cup dry instant couscous
• 1/2 cup water (or such other quantity as specified in the couscous instructions)
• 1 tbsp hot water
• 1/2 onion, filed chopped
• 1/2 tsp nutmeg powder
• 1 pinch saffron
• 4 almonds, finely chopped
• 1 tbsp olive oil
• Salt and pepper to taste

Method

1. Grind the mustard seeds, paprika and peppercorns into a fine mixture.
2. Pat dry the tuna filets and rub salt into them.
3. Place them skin side down and dust with the mustard seeds powder. Cover the flesh side evenly with the mustard powder mixture by shaking the dish.
4. Set aside for 15 minutes.
5. Heat the oil in a pan, on high heat. 
6. Once it starts smoking, reduce the heat to a medium-high and add the tuna filets skin-side down.
7. Let the skin crispen up and then flip to cook the flesh side down.
8. Once the mustard crust forms and the fish is cooked to your desired doneness (I like it well done), remove from the heat.
9. Add the saffron to the tbsp of hot water and set aside to infuse.
10. Heat the oil in a pan and add the onions.
11. Sweat out the onions till they turn translucent, then lower the heat and add the couscous.
12. Stir around to even coat the couscous and add the nutmeg powder.
13. Heat the remaining water and add the saffron liquid to it.
14. Add the hot water to the couscous and set aside for 5 minuted, covered.
15. Add the chopped almonds to the couscous and fluff it.
16. Create a bed with the couscous and place the fish on top. Serve hot, with a sprinkling of lime juice.

Pan fried Pomfret with Zucchini Couscous

Got a new camera, so have put up bigger and clearer pictures. Also finally found some cous-cous in Bangalore, so I put the two together to produce that. A fresh filet of black pomfret lightly seasoned and pan fried served on a bed of zucchini couscous with some lemon juiced on top. You can use any firm white fleshed fish, I used pomfret as it adds sweetness and remains moist through the frying process. A thin bottom feeder, like sole is ideal for such pan frying as it skin crispens up beautifully. I rehydrated the couscous in chicken stock to add flavour, but ordinary salted water or vegetable stock can be used as well. This is quite literally a 15 minute dish, with the preparation taking around 10 minutes and the cooking another 5 minutes.

Ingredients

Fish

• 2 filets of black pomfret with skin
• 1 tsp paprika
• flour for dusting
• salt and pepper to taste
• 1 tbsp vegetable oil
• 1 tbsp butter

Cous-cous

• 3/4 cup dry couscous
• 3/4 cup chicken stock (or as per package instructions)
• 1/2 cup chopped zucchini
• Juice of 1 lemon

Method

1. Wash and pat dry the fish filets, and add the paprika, salt and pepper to the flesh side of the filets.
2. Rub the seasonings into the flesh of the fish and dust with flour.
3. Rub a little salt on the skin side of the fish.
4. Spread the flour on the fish and set aside for 10 minutes.
5. The flour and salt will pull some water out of the fish to make firmer.
6. Heat the oil in a pan.
7. When the oil begins to smoke, lower the heat to a moderate-high heat and add the butter.
8. Stir and melt the butter, and once the froth subsides add the fish, skin side down to the pan.
9. Shake a pan slightly to make sure the fish does not stick and then leave it on a moderate-high heat for 3-4 minutes.
10. Once the skin has crispened, gently flip the fish onto the flesh side.
11. Cook for another 2-3 minutes, until the fish is cooked through.
12. Remove from the pan and save the butter-oil mixture.
13. Heat the chicken stock and add it to the couscous, cover and set aside to rehydrate for 5 minutes.
14. Fry the zucchini in the butter-oil liquid (add a tbsp more oil in case the fish absorbs most of the oil), to soften and cook through.
15.  Mix the rehydrated couscous with the zucchini and create a bed of the couscous on a plate.
16. Place the fish over the couscous and dress with the lemon juice.