Couscous

• 1. Introduction

  ›

  Couscous is a North African dish of tiny steamed granules of rolled semolina, usually topped with a spoonful of stew. Each granule is only about 2 mm across. Yet this humble grain-like food raises surprisingly large questions. Where does its odd-sounding name come from? Who first rolled wheat into pellets and steamed them over a pot of simmering stew? How did a dish from the Berber world end up on tables in France, Sicily, Sardinia and beyond? And why do cooks in West Africa, Brazil and the Levant make their own versions from cassava, cornmeal, fonio or bulgur? The answers run from ancient graves to medieval cookbooks, and from a hand-rolled family ritual to the supermarket shelf.

  562226

• 2. A Name With Rival Roots

  ›

  The word couscous first turned up in French in the early 17th century. French borrowed it from the Arabic kuskus, which in turn comes from kaskasa, a verb meaning to pound. Pounding, however, may not be the original idea. The Algerian linguist Salem Chaker argues for a Berber origin. The term seksu is found in Berber varieties such as Kabyle and Riffian, while Touareg and Ghadames have the slightly different keskesu. A word spread over such a wide area, he suggests, is likely local. The Berber root *KS carries the sense of something well formed, well rolled and rounded.

  A second theory comes from María Teresa Santamaría Hernández, who studied the Arabic form kuskūs, first recorded in the 13th century in Al-Andalus. She finds it better explained by a Latin adjective, coscosus. The Latin noun coscus was an ancient Mediterranean word for small rounded or curved things. It was applied to small creatures such as worms, ants, termites and woodworms, and it appears in Latin veterinary treatises and glossaries. On this reading, coscosus meant full of worms, and the dish of tiny granules earned the label metaphorically.

  Medieval Spanish kept a trace of the journey. The word cozcucho, from Andalusi Arabic, is recorded in the 13th century. From the first half of the 15th century, alcuzcuzu, alcuzcuçu, cuzcuz and other variants named a dish seen as typical of Moors and Moriscos. In that same century Spaniards also called it formigos, hormigos and hormiguillos, meaning resembling ants, and the older name stayed in use alongside the insect nicknames.

  1742123

• 3. Digging For Origins

  ›

  Food historian Lucie Bolens believes couscous is millennia old and began in the ancient kingdom of Numidia, in present-day Algeria, during the reign of Masinissa. Her evidence is physical. Cooking vessels similar to a couscoussier, the steamer pot used for the dish, have been found in graves from the 3rd century BC in Kabylia, Algeria. These graves date to the time of the Berber kings of Numidia. Later finds point the same way. Utensils closely resembling couscoussiers from the 9th century turned up in Tiaret, Algeria. Couscoussiers from the 12th century were found in the ruins of Igiliz, in Morocco's Sous valley.

  Written records tell a more disputed story. Food writer Charles Perry places the dish among the Berbers of Algeria and Morocco, somewhere between the end of the Zirid dynasty in the 11th century and the rise of the Almohad Caliphate in the 13th. The historian Hady Idris notes that couscous is documented under the Hafsid dynasty but not the Zirid. Historian Marianne Brisville thinks it can be recognised in the 11th century under the word taam, with the oldest mention coming from Ouargla, Algeria.

  By the 12th century, Maghrebi cooks were already stirring flour with water to make light round balls of dough that could be steamed without turning to mush. In the 13th century the dish reached cookbooks. Maxime Rodinson found three couscous recipes in the Arabic Kitab al-Wusla ila al-Habib, written by an Ayyubid author. The anonymous Kitab al tabikh and Ibn Razin al-Tujibi's Fadalat al-khiwan contain recipes too. Ibn Razin's version would have a surprisingly long life far from North Africa.

  2330193132

• 4. Across The Sea

  ›

  In the town of Trapani, Sicily, cooks still make couscous to the medieval recipe of the Andalusian author Ibn Razin al-Tujibi. That is one outpost of a wider spread. The Berber dynasties of the 13th century are believed to have carried the dish to the Iberian Peninsula. Today, strangely, it is no longer part of traditional Spanish or Portuguese cooking.

  Another crossing came in the 18th century. Ligurian families who moved from Tabarka to Sardinia brought couscous with them to Carloforte, where the tradition took root.

  France has known the dish since the 16th century. It entered French cooking in earnest at the beginning of the 20th century, carried by the French colonial empire and by the Pieds-Noirs of Algeria. Later, immigrants from the Maghreb widened its reach. A 2011 survey in France ranked couscous as the third most popular dish in the country. Its journey from the Maghreb to French dinner tables depends on a very particular kind of kitchen work, which begins with a sieve.

  1913143536

• 5. Hands, Sieve And Steam

  ›

  Semolina is the hardest part of the durum wheat grain, and durum is the hardest of all wheats. That toughness lets it resist the grinding of the millstone. To make traditional couscous, cooks sprinkle the semolina with water and roll it between the hands into small pellets. A dusting of dry flour keeps the pellets apart before everything goes through a sieve. Pellets too small to count as finished granules fall through, and they are rolled again with dry semolina. The cycle repeats until every bit of semolina has become a tiny granule.

  The work is slow, so in the traditional method groups of people gather and make big batches over several days. The granules are dried in the sun and kept for months. Handmade couscous may need to be rehydrated as it is prepared, by moistening it and steaming it over the stew until light and fluffy. In some regions the base is farina, coarsely ground barley or pearl millet instead.

  The steamer has its own names: taseksut in Berber, kiskas in Arabic and couscoussier in French. Its base is a tall metal pot shaped like an oil jar, where meat and vegetables cook as a stew. The couscous sits in a steamer on top and soaks up those flavours. The lid has holes around the edge so steam can escape. If the holes are too big, damp cheesecloth lines the steamer.

  Modern production is largely mechanized, and the product is sold worldwide. Most couscous in Western grocery stores is pre-steamed and dried. Cooks add 1.5 measures of boiling water or stock to each measure of couscous and cover it tightly for about five minutes. That is quicker than regular couscous, most dried pasta, or dried grains such as rice. European supermarkets even sell packaged sets with canned vegetables and often meat. Done properly, the result is light and fluffy, never gummy or gritty.

  22673449

• 6. A Shared Heritage

  ›

  In December 2020, Algeria, Mauritania, Morocco and Tunisia won official recognition from UNESCO for the knowledge, know-how and practices around making and eating couscous. The dish was added to the Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. The four countries made a joint submission, and it was hailed as an "example of international cooperation." The listing protects a practice rather than a recipe. The four countries each serve couscous differently, and those differences are what the next chapter explores.

  3839162428

• 7. Tables Of The Maghreb

  ›

  Couscous in Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia and Libya usually comes with carrots, potatoes and turnips cooked in a spicy or mild broth. Chicken, lamb or mutton often goes with it. The grain itself varies in size. Berkoukes is a larger type of more than 3 mm, and an ultra-fine version measures around 1 mm.

  In Morocco, couscous is traditionally served on Fridays after the midday prayers. Its best-known form is couscous with seven vegetables, piled over a broth of beef, lamb or chicken. The vegetables include carrots, turnips, pumpkin, zucchini and cabbage, plus chickpeas. Another favourite is couscous tfaya, which pairs semolina and meat with a caramelized topping of onions, raisins, cinnamon and toasted almonds. It often arrives on a large communal clay platter called a gsaa.

  Tunisian couscous tends to be spicy and made with harissa. The meat may be lamb, beef, fish or seafood, and in southern regions sometimes camel. Fish couscous is a Tunisian specialty and can include octopus or squid in a hot red sauce. In Mauritania, the couscous uses large wheat grains called mabroum and looks darker than the yellow Moroccan kind. It is cooked with lamb, beef or camel alongside onion, tomato and carrots, then served with ghee, known locally as dhen.

  Libya, in Tripoli and the west, usually serves couscous with lamb. Camel appears sometimes and beef rarely, though not at official ceremonies or weddings.

  Sweet versions exist too. Libyans make a dessert of couscous with dates, sesame and pure honey, called maghrood. In Tunisia the dessert is masfuf, which may include raisins, grapes or pomegranate seeds. In Egypt, couscous, or koskosi, is sweet by tradition. People eat it for breakfast, as a light evening meal or as dessert. It is steamed or soaked with melted butter and hot water, then topped with sugar, cinnamon, grated coconut, raisins and nuts such as almonds, walnuts or hazelnuts. Some cooks add sweetened condensed milk.

  Malta takes a different path. Its kusksu is a small round pasta slightly larger than couscous, cooked with broad beans, known as ful, and ġbejniet, a local cheese.

  424041629

• 8. Cousins Around The World

  ›

  Orzo and risoni are pasta shapes about the size of couscous, yet they are a different food. Pasta is made from ground wheat that is molded or extruded. Couscous is crushed wheat flour rolled into granules. The two have similar nutritional value, though pasta is usually more refined. Israeli couscous, an extruded and toasted pasta, shares neither the main ingredients nor the method of true couscous.

  Granule dishes turn up around the world. Attiéké, a staple of Côte d'Ivoire and nearby parts of West Africa, is made from granulated grated cassava. Dambou from Niger may use semolina for special occasions but is often made with rice, millet or other grain, with moringa leaves. In France, a variant called couscous aux épinards uses spinach in place of the moringa. Wusu-wusu is made from fonio in the Hausa region of Nigeria, and in Benin, Togo and Ghana.

  On Sardinia, fregula is a pasta of semolina dough rolled into balls 2-3 mm across and toasted in an oven. In Greece and Turkey, kouskousaki, or kuskus in Turkish, is a boiled pasta served with cheese and walnuts. Brazil's Northeast has cuscuz, made from cornmeal and eaten hot with meat or cold with milk. In the state of São Paulo, a specialty combines cornmeal with tomato sauce, egg, peas, sweet corn and hearts of palm. It sets in a mould with a hole in the middle, then gets turned out onto a plate.

  In the Levant, moghrabieh takes its name from the Arabic word for the Maghreb. It uses durum semolina rolled into larger pearls and is common in Jordan, Lebanon and Syria. The pearls are cooked in a stew or flavoured with cinnamon and served with a chicken and chickpea broth.

  Palestinian maftoul is rolled from bulgur that has been soaked in water. The pearls are steamed and then dried in the sun for preservation. Hand-rolling makes the grains uneven. The name comes from the Arabic root fa-ta-la, meaning to roll or to twist. It appears in print as early as 1907, in Elihu Grant's The Peasantry of Palestine.

  749515260