This vibrant, fresh tasting salad is the perfect accompaniment to any warm weather picnic. It also makes a great change from the standard potato salad and macaroni salad that seems to be present at just about every picnic pitched on American soil.
Couscous used to be hard to find, outside of major cities, but nowadays most large grocery stores, in just about every town, carry at least a variety or two. Do yourself a favor and stay away from the flavored ones. Choose instead, plain couscous. That way you can season and flavor it any way you want.
The recipe also calls for tarragon. While, in general, I prefer fresh herbs over dry, on occasion I do use dried herbs. Tarragon is one of those herbs, though, that I refuse to use in its dried form. I feel its flavor just suffers too much from the drying. Do yourself a favor and use fresh in this recipe.
Mediterranean Couscous Salad
1 box (15 oz.) couscous
2 cups water
3/4 cup + 2 Tbsp. extra virgin olive oil
1 lemon juiced + 1 1/2 Tbsp. zest finely minced and reserved
1 1/2 Tbsp. fresh tarragon, minced
1 clove garlic minced
1/2 medium onion, minced
1 1/4 cups sundried tomatoes, re-hydrated and chopped
salt
freshly ground black pepper
To prepare couscous, bring water, a pinch of salt and 2 Tbsp. of olive oil to a boil. Pour in couscous, remove from heat, cover and allow to sit for 5 minutes. Fluff with a fork then chill. In a large bowl combine lemon juice, zest, remaining olive oil, garlic, onion, tarragon and sundried tomatoes. Stir to combine then add the chilled couscous, breaking up any lumps as you mix it up. Season with salt and pepper. Allow to sit at least 2 hours or overnight. Taste and adjust seasoning by adding more salt, pepper or lemon juice. If the couscous seems too dry drizzle with more extra virgin olive oil.