Algerian Couscous and Mkhabez

Welcome to the week of Algeria! Along with other North African countries Algeria is well known for their couscous, boasting over 1,000 different kinds. I decided to do a play on the traditional dish of the capital Algiers, Couscous Algérois.

Algeria is found on the coast of the Mediterranean and along the Sahara desert. They are known for being very warm and kind to strangers.

Mack and I were both excited by this dish I used a recipe from allrecipes, https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/256729/algerian-couscous/

I substituted the mutton chops for more drumsticks and ended up making my own ras el hanout. I ended up substituting the Harissa for Sriracha. Bellow is a picture of all that went into the ras el hanout.

The dish was very easy to make the only mistake was I over salted the couscous. I thought it was off and added some at the last minute before serving. I was also worried it would be too spicy for Mack but she loved it and even added some of the hot sauce to hers. The spice was more warm and welcoming than strong.

Mack worked hard on the Mkhabez. These cookies were beautiful. One was rose water and the other orange blossom. We had to sift the powder sugar into the flavored water. These dense almond cookies were very tasty but also very powerful.

Overall this was a win. We ate the whole meal and will make again. For the three days after I looked forward to having this as leftovers. I give this a 9 out of 10. The chicken was so moist and flavorful and the spice was perfect. I was worried that it would of dried out but the meat was literally falling off of the bone!

Check in next week for the country of Andorra where we will be making Escudella.