apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

You're right. That one's easy. Here goes: perhaps Tabbouleh with sun dried tomatoes? Just a guess...

Or, grind up the parsley, lemon juice, lemon zest, chopped sun dried tomatoes and some coarse salt and fresh-cracked pepper with olive oil to make a condiment.

-then-

Grill some chicken seasoned sparsely with salt, pepper and lemon, fluff your couscous (O.k.: hee hee), and serve with that lovely grind-y stuff. Add some wine and crusty bread. Perhaps some grilled veggies. Perfecto.

I would make it as a cold salad. I often use a tip from Jamie Oliver that makes al dente couscous - use cold water instead of boiling. It makes a nice firm couscous that's perfect for a salad. I use roast chicken, mint, cilantro, roast veggies and feta cheese.

your cupboard challenges aren't really challenges at all. It seems as though you are choosing ingredients to combine that already obviously go together, at least over here in my kitchen.

i always add some broth granules to the water to give the couscous extra taste.
thinly slice sundried tomatoes, add pepper, salt to taste and extra virgin olive oil.
if you've got some left over feta and black olives, crumble into the couscous, and, again if you have, add lots and lots of torn leaves of fresh basil.
make a marinade for fish or chicken with minced parsley, garlic, coarse salt, pepper, extra vergin olive oil and the lemon juice.
grill and serve on the couscous which you have left to chill in the fridge.

msjessica - yes indeed, we do choose ingredients that have some complementarity, as we want this to be genuinely helpful. It seemed gimmicky to throw out combinations of, say, cinnamon candies, paprika and steel cut oats (to give an example of some other things in our cupboard at present) or other wacky combos that can't make a good meal. We do stick to things genuinely in our cupboards!

If you have a good, tough combo, please feel free to send it in! The cupboard challenges are wide open to our readers! :-)