How to avoid splattering your eyes with couscous
After giving details on how to eat a tagine or roast lamb using *just* the three fingers of the right hand, Frommer’s 1981 North Africa guidebook has this advice on how to handle the next course in the feast, couscous:
“More likely than not, you will botch your first meal [of tagine or lamb]; your neighbor will take pity on you and will feed you with the choicest morsels. Accept them gratefully, but don’t stop trying yourself. However, don’t go to the point of tackling couscous. You will gape with admiration at your fellow guest, particularly at a country meal. Still using only those three fingers, they take a little bit of that elusive steaming semolina, knead it for a few moments, work it into an almost perfectly spherical ball and then, with a deft flick of the thumb, dispatch it into their mouths. Your own attempt will be pitiful and, since it is very unpleasant to splatter your eyes with couscous, you may modestly accept the spoon that has been thoughtfully set aside for you.”
Posted by jeffkoehler in on the road |
