Quigley's Couscous Salad

We spent the last weekend in lovely Aurora, IL with my brother and his family.  We went to a Kane County Cougar's baseball game with the whole family on Friday, spent a special Saturday with my nephew, also my godson, then I cooked Father's Day dinner for the family.  It was a great time and we don't get to do it nearly often enough!

Monday was just Dave and I.  My sister-in-law had recommended wandering around downtown Naperville and gave us a couple of restaurants to try.  One was Quigley's Irish Pub.  It was raining and lunch time so we ducked in to get out of the rain and have lunch.

I had a turkey Reuben.  I'm not a fan of sauerkraut!  Dave had a "real" Reuben.  We both ordered the couscous salad as our side.  It was delicious, a mixture of couscous, quinoa, orzo, red and green peppers and dried cherries.  There were also these little orange colored bits I didn't recognize.

I asked the waitress and she said they were baby garbanzo beans!  Yes, you can make garbanzo beans taste good!  You just have to get them when they are babies!

I asked if they would give up the recipe and to my surprise she told us she was pretty sure we could get the grain mixture at Trader Joe's.  Another reason to love that place!  Then they just add the peppers and dried cherries and a little olive oil.

So when we got home, we stopped at Trader Joe's and we did find the "Harvest Grains Blend".   We picked up some peppers and a purple onion and Craisins are stocked in my pantry!

Simple and tasty!  I love it when I can recreate a recipe!

I prepared the grains per the package directions.  I used chicken stock rather than water and I used a walnut infused olive oil instead of butter.  Once cooled I added the chopped vegetables and Craisins.