Thursday 24 February 2011

Moroccan Quorn Tagine

31/70


This week I have trialled quite possibly my favourite recipe EVER from Quorn. It was for a Moroccan Tagine and my goodness me it was tasty.


This is the tagine while it was cooking:




And here it is served on a bed of cous cous:




In order to make this recipe I did have to go out and hunt down some Harissa paste which I have never used before. Thankfully my local Sainsbury's stock it and a small jar is only 99p. The recipe actually calls for 'Rose Harissa' which you can buy online and is a specialist version but I think the standard version more than sufficed in what was a spectacularly tasty meal for us.


Harissa is a chilli based paste but this recipe is not overly spicy, the base sauce is chopped tomatoes, red onion and garlic, peppers and cherry tomatoes are added along with cumin and the harissa - to which quorn pieces are added at an early stage to soak in lots of flavour. 


The sauce is then thinned out with vegetable stock and allowed to simmer for around half an hour, the result is a spicy, tangy, sweet sauce with a thick consistency that is bulked out by chick peas and absolutely bursting with flavour. Coriander is stirred in late in the cooking process, before serving, and this again enhances the flavours and is very distinctive. 


This recipe makes 4 good sized portions and we ate the second lot on the following night - 24 hours maturing in the fridge actually improved and enhanced the flavours even more. Served with cous cous this is an incredibly filling and enjoyable meal. A bonus is that it is also very low in fat/weight watchers points.


One portion of this tagine works out at only 8 propoints broken down as follows: quorn (2), chick peas (3), oil (2), apricots (1). With a standard portion of cous cous for another 2 points this equates to a very filling meal for an amazing value of 10 points.


I will most definitely be making this again and am very pleased to have been introduced to Harissa as such a fab ingredient. We enjoyed this very much and I would be inclined to give it a 10/10 - the husband thinks it is very good but not quite worthy of that accolade so overall we have agreed on a 9/10.


Absolutely delicious!

2 comments:

  1. This looks delicious and you have definitely persuaded me to give this a try! I would possibly leave out the apricots and I don't really like them but I'm sure it wouldn't affect the final dish too much.
    Its great that ingredients such as harissa are becoming more commonplace. They're so delicious!

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  2. Yeah, definitely just leave apricots out - it won't harm the dish. Mind you I am not a fan of them either but in this dish it seemed to work. Enjoy!

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