Couscous Salad with Sausage, Greens and Beans

As any regular - or even semi-regular reader of this blog knows, I'm a sucker for a new recipe. I love to cook  - and love to take recipes I find and tweak them a bit to make them right for us. My latest such recipe is one I found on LearnVest - Couscous Salad w/ Sausage Greens and Beans. It was part of this 10 Easy Recipes for Cool Summer Eating slideshow - so you have to click through to the 3rd recipe to see the original. Here is my version:

Couscous Salad with Sausage, Greens and Beans
Serves: 4

1 1/2 cups couscous
Salt
1 bunch kale, trimmed of the thick stalk in the middle and chopped
Olive oil
2  sausages (we used some Cajun chicken sausage we had)
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 can of garbanzo beans (original recipe calls for white beans)
3 tablespoons white wine
Large handful of basil leaves, chopped
1/3 cup grated Parmesan cheese 

First, make the couscous - just follow the package directions - and keep it covered until you've made the rest of it.

Second, make the kale. Bring a big pot of water to boil. Add a couple teaspoons salt and the kale. Boil for 12-15 minutes, until the kale is tender. Reserve 1 cup of the water, then drain the kale.

Since the sausage I used was already cooked, I just sliced it up and warmed it in a heavy saucepan in some olive oil. Then I added the garlic, the beans and the wine. Let it reduce to just a film - then add the reserve kale water and reduce again. Add the kale back in.

Stir the couscous to get rid of clumps then add that in to the saucepan as well. Remove from heat - add basil and Parmesan and serve. I even added a little more Parmesan to the top of the individual servings.

Enjoy!