WHITE TUNA & COUSCOUS IN POTATO SHELLS seasoned with some Italian inspiration!!

Another fishy recipe.....I think this week is going to be seafood seasoned here at Cardamom Hills because this post is followed by a leftover creation from the tuna I used for this one. The next recipe, one which I made today and is in waiting is a prawn dish (I won’t tell you what it is! Wait for itJ) so I guess we’ll just call it seafood week!

Coming to our dish for the day - potato shells filled with white tuna and couscous seasoned with some basil, oregano, garlic, etc....etc....Except for the jalapeno, the flavours are all Italian inspired. In the pictures, I garnished it with black olives and some balsamic reduction which brought in some awesome flavours. So if you really want to enjoy this dish, have it with the same garnishJ.

I did not oven bake my potato shells. Instead I boiled whole potatoes, halved them, scraped out the some flesh and baked them for 5mins. The reason being, I read recently that baking for long drains out a large percent of vitamin C present in potato skin (That’s your nutrition fact for the day!! J). The white tuna I used was fresh....cooked the fillets with some salt, garlic and jalapeno paste in minimum water. But canned tuna is just fine. I goofed up at one point. If you noticed, the mozzarella on top burnt. My little one came hunting for me just as the oven went beep. By the time I finished with her and came back to transfer the stuff into a plate, the damage was done!! I hate it when the mozzarella burnsL.

Oh! And yea, I had left over tuna, couscous and the potato scraped out of the shells...now can you guess what I did to them?? Let’s see how smart my foodie buddies are J and if you ain’t able to guess, wait until my next post...hehehe....

Leaving you with the recipeJ. Happy cooking!!

Ingredients: (serves- 4)

Potatoes - 2 medium sized

Mozzarella cheese- grated 1 cup

Parsley - 2 sprigs

White Tuna - 1 fillet/200gm can

Couscous- ¼ cup

Olive oil- 1 tablespoon

Onion- 1 medium sized chopped finely

Garlic - 8 cloves crushed

Pickled jalapeno - 2 tbsp (reduce for less heat, alternately green chilli paste can be used)

Tomato - 1 medium sized chopped

Fresh Basil leaves-4 sprigs chopped finely

Parmesan cheese - 2 tablespoon freshly grated (increase if you like it)

Salt to taste

Method:

1.       Cook potatoes with salt in water till fully done, cut into halves, scrap flesh out. Apply some butter on each shell. Preheat oven to 180⁰C and bake shells for 5mins.

2.       Rub tuna fillet with salt, 1 tsp garlic and pickled jalapeno. Cook in ¼ cup water till water drains and mash into coarse mixture.

3.       In a deep pan, sauté garlic, add onion. Let it sweat.

4.       Add chopped tomato. Cook with lid on till tomato is done.

5.       Add parmesan cheese. Mix well into a semi-sauce consistency.

6.       Add 1cup water (amount required to cook couscous, refer instructions on pack) and bring to boil.

7.       Add couscous and basil leaves. Off the heat and let it rest with lid on for required amount of time (for time- again refer back of pack).

8.       Fluff the couscous with a fork.

9.       Add a spoon full of couscous into the potato shells, top with tuna mixture. Sprinkle mozzarella and top with some parsley leaves.

10.   Bake in preheated oven at 180⁰C for 10mins and take out immediately. (If you let it stay there the cheese will turn brown like mine L)

11.   Garnish with some black olives and few zig zags of balsamic reduction and serve hot!

Tips n Tricks:

·         If you can’t take all that effort in step one for some Vitamin C, you can halve and bake the potatoesJ.

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