Sometimes you find a word that perfectly suits what is happening in your life… this month I found ‘bestovers’ – similar to leftovers, but where the thing you make with the leftovers comes out better than the thing you originally made!
I made a couscous salad this month with chunks of kumara and orange to go with some home-smoked fish, and we had loads of it left over and apart from give it to the chickens (who would have loved it) I wasn’t very inspired about how to make it into another meal… but then I discovered a recipe for couscous cakes online which I played around with, and the cakes came out very well so I thought I would share the recipe.
Couscous cakes
Ingredients
- 2 cups cooked couscous
- ½ cup panko crumbs (or finely broken up cream crackers or Matzo crackers – something to add bulk without making the mixture too heavy)
- 200g smoked fish (bite-sized pieces)
- Small handful of basil leaves, chopped
- ½ tbsp ground cumin
- 1 or 2 eggs, beaten
- handful panko crumbs
- 2 tbsp fat or butter
Method
- Mix all the ingredients together. Add the eggs last, adding just enough to bind the mixture together – you want it not to be sticky, but firm enough to hold together.
- Shape a small piece of mixture into a cake or patty, roll in panko crumbs and set aside. Use up all the mixture (I made about 10 from mine).
- Heat a heavy cast-iron fry pan and add the fat or butter. When it starts to sizzle, add the cakes and cook thoroughly on both sides until crunchy and brown.
- Serve immediately, perhaps with a green salad and some relish or chutney.