Cauliflower Flatbread

This was one of the strangest, silliest things I've ever made, but it was surprisingly tasty, so I thought I'd memorialize it here.

I've been avoiding sugar, white flour, and the like (also, red meat) for the last month. That's pretty easy: Just make different foods. We make curries and salads instead of sandwiches and pasta dishes. I'm not the kind to seek out special products (low-carb bread?!) or recipes to mimic the things I'm not eating. But I stumbled upon a paleo diet blog while looking up the nutritional content of something or other, and it had a recipe for cauliflower pizza.

The internet, it turns out, is teeming with recipes for cauliflower pizza.

The idea stuck in my head, and finally I just decided to try it.

Basically, the cauliflower gives structure to the ... well, it's not a dough at all — more of a malleable paste. Cheese provides most of the flavor and browning. And egg holds it together. I didn't expect each slice would stay in one piece, but it does.

Reading these two posts helped me: The Lucky Penny and Closet Cooking. I didn't squeeze the water out of the cooked cauliflower, though I'll try that next time. I won't recreate the entire recipe here — read their blogs — but here are the proportions I used:

1/2 small head of cauliflower, grated on a box grater, about 2 1/2 cups before nuking
4 oz cheese (I used cheddar because we have a lot of it, with a little Parmesan)
1 pinch salt
1 egg
1 t Italian herbs

I put goat cheese, roasted red pepper strips and marinated artichokes on it, and baked it on my Silpat, which was perfect, for about 35 minutes (it was very thin) at 400 degrees.

I couldn't bring myself to call it pizza, because, well, no, but I think flatbread is a reasonable term. It's very cheesy and really fun to make.

Fancy Food

This cauliflower soup came from Rocco Dispirito's Flavor, which I received for Christmas several years ago.  This is the second time I've made it, and both times I ended up a little disgruntled by how labor-intensive it is.  First, you make a basil simple syrup, which involves two saucepans and a blender; then, browning the pine nuts in oil--a small skillet; and finally cooking a whole head of cauliflower with a sweated onion--one saucepan and the blender, and finally another clean pot to reheat the soup.  And this is only a first-course soup, as it's very light.  I made focaccia with sage and walnuts to go with it, which made a balanced supper.

We ate it cold for lunch the next day, equally tasty.

Why am I whining about this?  Because I prefer to make simple things.  I've vowed to live without recipes for a while.  I already know how to cook!

On the positive side, there was leftover basil syrup, and I made this drink at Eva's suggestion:  gin, soda, a squeeze of lemon, and a teaspoon of the syrup.  Delicious!

Return to Sanity

Well, that’s the goal, anyway. We’re not even very busy, but my plan to eat vegetable-rich, vibrant, balanced meals has often given way to overly rich, hastily-executed ones instead.

On Monday, our newly widowed neighbor heard water running, went outside to investigate, and went flying down her ice-covered brick steps. The pipe carrying water to her swamp cooler on the roof had frozen and burst. Dad went up the roof to diagnose the problem, we turned off the water supply, she called her plumber who came within a couple of hours, and for just over $100 she got a new pipe and bonus resolution of a clogged bathtub drain. But this definitely required a comforting meal of homemade pizza with ham, green peppers, and olives. Dad contributed a salad of baby spinach, arugula, and mesclun.

I made Rocco DiSpirito’s Cauliflower Soup with Basil Syrup and Pine Nuts for the first course, but decided it wasn’t really worth the trouble. Fun to do, not all that exciting to eat. I have read in the Washington Post and other places recently that cauliflower is now fashionable. Imagine that. How did your roasted cauliflower turn out?

The 100% Cauliflower Solution

Slice it and roast it! I read this recipe in the Thanksgiving issue of Bon Appetit magazine and, of course, modified it.

Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Cut a small head of cauliflower in half and then slice it thinly—less than ½ inch. Place it in a rimmed baking sheet which has been brushed with a little olive oil. Sprinkle with 1 teaspoon coarse salt.

Roast for about 15 minutes.

Meanwhile, whisk together:

2 tablespoons melted butter
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
1 tablespoon mustard (Dijon or brown)
1 teaspoon grated lemon peel

Drizzle butter mixture over cauliflower and roast about 10 minutes longer. Sprinkle with chopped parsley. Serve warm or at room temperature.

I confess that I ate about a third of this as soon as it emerged from the oven. I liked it later at room temperature, but Dad said he would have preferred it warm. It was dynamite, though, with the brown edges and lemony flavor. Maybe we could set up a Roasted Cauliflower booth at the state fair, and compete with corn dogs.

Instead of a beautiful picture of my cauliflower dish, I offer a picture of our kitchen after dinner.