When we talk about the traditional cuisine of North Africa, we must mention the Cous Cous (also called couscous, couscous or kuskusús). The first historical records of this food date back to the XNUMXth century and appear in a kitchen manuscript called "Kitāb al-taṭbīj fī l-Magrib wa-l-Andalus", a book that contained recipes for Arabic dishes and where you can find what can be considered the first recipe for how to prepare cous cous.
This typical dish is based on durum wheat semolina -although there are also variants based on barley and green wheat-, where the ideal is to have quality grains, since if so, the kneading and cooking will be perfect and will combine correctly with the flavor of legumes, spices and meats.
Prepare Cous Cous
The Cous Cous has as its base ingredient semolina, the same that is obtained by grinding the part of the wheat that remains hard and does not become flour, although, if we do not have the semolina, we can choose other ingredients such as polenta, rice or barley.
When we have the semolina, we proceed to cook it in a steamer (if we have one of two levels we can cook -in the lower part- the meat stew or the vegetables, whatever we are going to have as a garnish). This cooking should be about two hours until we obtain a loose paste.
How to accompany the couscous
This original Moroccan dish has various forms of accompaniment, however, in its country of origin it is usually accompanied with pieces of mutton chicken meat, in addition, it is served with broth -to be able to soak the semolina-, and vegetables such as turnip , zucchini and onions.
In other countries, it is usually accompanied with red pepper puree, and, for example, in Italy, instead of accompanying it with meat or chicken broth, it is accompanied with fish broth and in the United States it is accompanied with the same complements that pasta since it is considered as one.
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