Day 111

Tabouli: I ventured out this afternoon to maybe find something for lunch, and I ended up at the Whole Foods on Ponce. I rarely shop there due to the high prices, but occasionally there's something on the hot bar or salad bar that catches my eye. Today I saw something that I'd heard about for years, but never actually tried: tabouli. I knew it was some sort of wheat-based vegetarian dish, but past that, I knew nothing. Luckily, WF will let you sample before you commit, so I asked for one of the little sample cups so I could taste.

WF listed the ingredients as "bulgur wheat, brown rice, onions, tomatoes, cucumbers, couscous, lemon juice, wild rice." I suspected that it would be a lot like cooked couscous, but I was slightly wrong. The texture of the bulgur was almost like half-cooked couscous, with a chewy, nutty feel. Not bad, but not that great, either. It reminded me a lot of the wheatberry salad I tried a few weeks ago, and the remaining ingredients definitely added a lot more flavor to the bland-ish bulgur and rice. A little too much onion in this version for me, but I doubt I'd eat it again anyway.

For the record, I'm not sure what the correct spelling of this dish is. I've seen several different versions, and this is the one that WF used.