Innovating with cauliflower - dithering over a lunch party
“Cauliflower is a blank canvas that takes on any flavor or personality,” Rachael Ray
Once again I'm dithering over what to cook for the friends who are coming to my April lunch party. A candidate as a support or as an entrée or part of an entrée is cauliflower because they are cheap at the moment and I have one in my fridge. If I don't use it soon it will be past its best. Maybe it is already!
I realise that I have written about cauliflower two or three times before, and maybe I shall continue into the future with it as well. But never mind. This time I am focussing on some of the new things to do with it - mainly cauliflower steak - and also on whether I'm really brave enough to try something really standalone and new or shall I chicken out and just do something that can be mixed with a whole lot of other things - a sort of mezze course. A bit of this or that.
Cauliflower steak - yes it's a thing. Beloved by Michelin starred chefs and everyone else as well. What it means is that you cut thick slices of the cauliflower - all the way through, then either roast it, fry it or combine boiling and one of the other two. With the addition of various spices and sauces.
What tempted me to give it a go was a recipe by good old Nigel Slater. He just calls it cauliflower slices rather than steak - but it's the same thing. I thought it looked pretty good and very suitable for a first course. And it featured horseradish which I love and which I have spoken about before. I did finally track some down, but it won't be fresh grated horseradish which is what Mr. Slater recommends. The cauliflower slice is sitting on a cauliflower purée and has a crispy topping of fried breadcrumbs, pumpkin seeds, parsley and the aforesaid parsley. Then I got to thinking that if people really didn't like cauliflower - and some people don't - then it's a lot of cauliflower to get through to be polite. So I'm sort of going off the idea.
Or à la Grèque, which is a classic French hors d'oeuvre method of cooking vegetables in a vinegary, spicy liquid and then cooling. Or pickled. Or maybe one of those little shot glasses of delectable soup.
What to do? My problem really but it did show me that the innovative cooking fraternity is constantly finding new ways of doing things with cauliflower. And all of those things above lend themselves to all sorts of variations. Opinion seems to be divided as to whether it is the next big thing in vegetables or not. There are certainly a lot of them around, so somebody must be buying them. I guess they are more filling than a lot of vegetables - like aubergines and potatoes an In a way it's similar to potatoes in its versatility, though it has a much stronger taste. And, of course, they are healthy. Some call them a super food - if you believe in super foods that is.
"there are ways to bring out the best of the flavors locked in its brainy white florets, and there are ways to make it taste like rotten eggs." Kitchen Think
And I guess that's what I'm scared of. As I said, not everyone likes it. Maggie Beer, for example does not mention it at all in her Harvest book even as a 'with' ingredient.
I also don't have a lot of time on Saturday morning so anything that can be prepared the day before is really good.
I shall have to think some more. Shall I be brave, or conservative. And I haven't even mentioned soup or cauliflower cheese.
POSTSCRIPT: In the end I did sort of chicken out and had bits of this and that for the first course, but one of them was the cauliflower popcorn shown above. Yummy - several of my guests asked me how to do it. So go get your Coles Magazine now! Well - you just cook the florets until soft. Swirl them around a beaten egg in a bowl and then swirl them in a mixture of breadcrumbs, grated Parmesan, chopped thyme and a touch of paprika or smoked paprika. (You can obviously vary this mix.) Roast in a hot oven for 20 minutes, stirring from time to time and serve hot. I actually cooked them, cooled them and then reheated.
