Warm cous cous and barley salad with mustard chicken and roasted potatoes

(serves 4)

Recently I was asked to go on a high carb diet for 3 days (to do a particular blood test), talk about a dream come true! So i thought i'd take this chance and make a max carb loading (but healthy) dish! Funnily enough, i looked at the recommended diet later and realised it was pretty much just a normal day's diet for me lol..

Carb loading - Purple sweet potato, potatoes, mix of pearl barley and israeli cous cous

On another note, I've decided that barley is a healthy carbohydrate that i should try to include in my diet more often - low GI, high in fibre, magnesium, zinc, antioxidants, phytochemicals, all those important healthy words, and most inspiring of all, i still have half a kg left in the pantry from a year ago :$. As healthy as barley is, i've found it tricky to think of some good recipes for it ~ it's very chewy and tough and not overly tasty. However i've found that blending it in with another more appealing carbohydrate works well for me, e.g. cous cous or quinoa and  definitely helps to make the dish more filling!

Prep time: 1hr
Cooking time: 20 min

Ingredients
400g chicken thigh / Maryland
3 potatoes
2 medium sweet potatoes (purple)
1 C pearl barley
1 C israeli cous cous
handful of green beans
1/2 red capsicum
1/2 leek
3 cloves garlic

Dressing
5T Mayo
3T seeded mustard
2-3 tsp Lemon juice
Salt
1 tsp sugar
Dash of apple cider vinegar
1 drop of Worcestershire sauce

Method
1. Preheat the oven to 180˚C.
2. Poach the chicken - boil a pot of water (enough to cover the chicken) then place the chicken in, bring back to the boil then turn off the heat and leave in for 1hr. Remove from the water and shred.
NB. You may need to reheat the water after 40min to ensure it cooks through.
3. Peel the sweet potatoes and cut into bite-size pieces. Cut the potatoes into bite-size pieces also and toss with olive oil, salt and pepper. Roast in the oven for 40-45min, turning at around 20min.

4. Cook the pearly barley and cous cous in 2 C boiling water for about 15min until al dente. Drain and set aside.
5. Finely chop the garlic. Dice the green beans and capsicum and cut the leek into thin circles.

6. In a medium saucepan, sauté the garlic, leek and green beans with 1/2 T olive oil and a pinch of salt for 3-4min, then add in the capsicum and toss for another few minutes until lightly cooked.
7. Add in the barley, cous cous, remove from the heat and toss with a drizzle of olive oil, salt and pepper. Top with the potatoes and sweet potatoes.

8. Make the dressing by combining the mayo, mustard, lemon juice, vinegar, sugar and Worcestershire sauce. Season with salt to taste.  Add the chicken to the dressing and toss.

9. In the saucepan, add the chicken and the remaining dressing, toss to combine and serve up!