One-pan chicken and couscous recipe

Published August 2025 | 5 min read
Expert contributor: Purva Gulyani, accredited practising dietitian
Words by Tegan Forder

Need a simple and tasty dinner? Try this one-pan chicken and couscous recipe and learn practical ways to make home cooking easier.

Confronting the 'what’s for dinner?' question every day can feel exhausting. But home cooking doesn’t have to be hard work, according to accredited practising dietitian, Purva Gulyani.

She says while ordering takeaway can be tempting, the convenience factor comes with nutritional downsides.

“Takeaway meals are made to be tastier with salt, fat and sugars. They have less fibre and more preservatives compared to what you would do at home,” explains Purva. “Home cooking helps you have control over the type and quality of ingredients you're using.”

And while cooking a meal from scratch might seem more expensive, it’s often cheaper than takeaway or eating out.

Purva is a big fan of the plate model – filling half your plate with vegetables, a quarter with protein and a quarter with high-fibre carbohydrates.

She says this approach not only makes meals more nutritionally balanced, but also helps you plan quick, family-friendly dinners.

“If you understand that plate model, then you can build up any ingredients into any meal.”

How to start meal prepping

While many of us feel too tired or too busy to whip up a meal at the end of the day, Purva believes we all need to learn the skill of meal prepping.

“Meal planning and prepping is absolutely the answer for making things easier. If you plan right, you never go wrong,” she advises.

“Start with small steps of one day at a time. For example, on a Sunday just focus on getting food ready for your breakfast, lunch and dinner on Monday.”

Keeping things flexible is key. “Instead of thinking, ‘I have to make this recipe with this ingredient’, it’s more about, ‘I’ve got this; I’ll put it together with this’. It makes things a lot simpler.”

Tips for quick and easy home cooking

Get the right tools

Kitchen tools like slow cookers and air fryers are great time-savers, whether you’re cooking in bulk or preparing a family dinner.

Purva also recommends a sandwich press, blender and vegie dicer to save time in the kitchen.

Stock up your pantry

Stock up on ingredients like canned fish, frozen vegetables, tinned beans and microwaveable rice and quinoa for quick, easy and healthy meals.

“If you have the right ingredients in the pantry or your fridge, you will go for those first and not think about takeaway,” says Purva.

Think ahead

Save time by loading up your fridge and freezer with marinated chicken in sealable bags and pre-cooked batches of pasta and quinoa.

“For example, I might do a pasta salad or quinoa salad or warm up some pasta for bolognese.”

Choose easy meals

Put nutrient-dense meals like salads and slow cooker recipes like lentil bolognese, curries, soups and stews on your weekly menu plan.

“I have a South Asian background, and in our culture curry paste is a big part of our cooking,” says Purva. “I make a big batch of it and let it sit in the fridge, so when I want to cook, it takes 10 minutes for a quick and easy curry.”

Loaded soups are another go-to and are a good use of those end-of-life vegies in the fridge. Add a can of chickpeas and some low-salt stock, let it simmer and you have a hearty one-pot meal.

To get more advice on how to support your family to have a nutritious and balanced diet, we've partnered with Ethos Health to create the Healthy Families for Life and Healthy Teens for Life resource library. All HCF members with health cover (except Overseas Visitors Health Cover) can access resources to support kids of all ages to develop positive nutritional habits for growth and development and reduce the risk of chronic conditions in their future.

Looking for meal inspiration? This delicious one-pan chicken and couscous recipe from Katrina Meynink’s Kitchen Keepers is easy to prepare – just assemble the ingredients and let the oven do the rest.

Chicken and couscous one-pan bake

Prep time: 10 minutes
Cooking time: 45 minutes
Serves: 4 to 6

Ingredients

• 1kg chicken thighs, cut into bite-sized chunks
• 250g pearl couscous
• 60ml (¼ cup) olive oil
• 1 tsp salt flakes
• 1 tsp ground turmeric
• 1 tsp ground cumin
• 1 tsp sumac
• 3 garlic cloves, crushed
• 2 tbsp tomato paste (concentrated purée)
• 1 tbsp pomegranate syrup, date syrup or honey
• 625ml (2½ cups) boiling chicken stock

To serve (garnish)

• Chopped coriander and parsley leaves
• Smoked almonds
• Fried onions

Quick lemon sumac dressing (optional)

• Juice of 1 lemon
• ½ cup Greek yoghurt
• Sumac, to taste

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 180°C.
2. Put the chicken and couscous in a roasting pan. Drizzle over the olive oil.
3. Add the salt, spices, garlic, tomato paste and syrup or honey, giving it all a quick toss to combine, then spread out evenly.
4. Pour over the chicken stock, place a piece of baking paper on top to touch and then wrap tightly with foil. Bake in the oven for 30 minutes.
5. Remove the foil and baking paper, and return to the oven for another 15 minutes or until the liquid has been absorbed and the chicken is cooked through.
6. If making the dressing, combine the ingredients in a bowl.
7. Garnish with the dressing (if using), chopped coriander and parsley, smoked almonds and then serve with fried onions.

Nourish your body

Whether you’re looking for healthy recipe ideas or support to help you reach your wellbeing goals, eligible members can get free access or save on the evidence-based CSIRO Total Wellbeing Diet^{^}. Created by Australia’s national science agency, it combines a higher-protein, low-GI eating plan with exercise and proven weight management tools to help improve habits and create lifelong positive behaviours.