Greek salad meets couscous, or the other way around

You know it's a bad start into the week when you put on your "bad days" jeans, and they feel a bit tight. Ahhhh, just the kind of monday I enjoy... But I have an explanation to this: I've recently discovered the joy of stretch-fabric jeans, did you know they made these???
Not being very aware about fashion and stuff, I use to buy the old kind of way jeans, the ones you need to wear for months until they soften somehow, the one that would not forgive you any extra slice of desert, at the risk of running out of air, and you have to put them on lying on your bed (you know what I'm talking about, right?)

Enters the stretchy jeans. Oh the joy! They adjust, adapt and expend if needed! But how sneaky is that in the end? I didn't notice that extra slice of pie made any difference (ok, I may have gone ignorant on purpose here too). It's like my old jeans were my too-much-dessert-chastity-belt... ehm.. so to speak.
The weather being so cold here doesn't really help on switching to a "summer" diet either. But I'm not looking for any more excuses, I know better than that by now, I just enjoyed my food lately, and now is time to be a bit more carefull and wise.

So today it's all about vegetables, I couldn't choose between making a greek salad or some couscous, so I decided to mix and match. This works hot or cold, as a main dish or as a side (see how flexible I can be). I used the vegetables I had at hands, feel free to add the ones you like to the recipe.

Greek Couscous

Serves 2/3

150gr of Couscous Semolina
2 Carrots
1 Kohlrabi
1 tin of Chickpeas
1/2 a Celeriac
1 Liter of Vegetable Brothe
1 Teaspoon of Ras El Hanout
1 Teaspoon of Red Paprika
1 Teaspoon of Cumin
1 Tomato
2 or 3 Green Fresh Onion
4 or 5 Pink Radish
1/2 a Cucumber
1 Tablespoon of Capers
50gr of Feta Cheese
Olive Oil
Apple Cider Vinegar
Salt

Start by making the couscous vegetables ready. Peel the carrots, the celeriac and the kohlrabi, slice the carrots and dice the celeriac and kohlrabi. In a pan place those vegetables in 1 liter of vegetable broth with the spices (ras el hanout, paprika and cumin), cook it for about an hour, try the vegetables they should be cooked thru and a bit spicy.

In the meantine, make the salad vegetables ready. Wash the radishes and slice them (I used a mandoline to have something even), than cut the green onions thinly and place them in a bowl with about 2 tablespoons of the vinegar.
Clean the tomato, remove the stem and the seeds inside just to keep the flesh and dice it quite small. Peel the cucumber, remove the seeds aswell and dice it the same size as the tomato, set aside.
Chop the capper and the feta cheese too.

If your vegetables are almost cooked, add the drained chickpeas so they heat up. In an other pan, heat up the volume of salted water that matches the volume of your 150gr of couscous semolina. When it's boiling, take it of the heat, add the semolina, put the lid back on and let it sit like that for 5 minutes.
After those 5 minutes, pour some olive oil on it, and using a fork, separate the little grains of couscous.

Drain the couscous vegetables in a colander, you can keep the water to add to your plate if you like it spicier. In a bowl, still using a fork, pour in the semolina, the tomato, the cucumber, the radish, the onion (with the vinegar), the capers and the feta cheese, stir to combine all ingredients. In a deep plate, pour in carefully your couscous and salad mixture so it forms a dome, than make a bit of a well in the middle and place the drained vegetables on top. Serve cold or hot.