All, I noticed Martha Shulman’s new recipes in the New York Times are themed on cauliflower, our winter flower here in the north east. We just made our regular spaghetti sauce last night so the first recipe, with olives, cauliflower and tomato sauce caught my eye. I note the other ones just for diversity–one of them is also indian style. (Same sets of spices folks, buy them once and don’t look back):

• Spaghetti with roasted cauliflower, tomato sauce and olives
• Spicy South Indian cauliflower

We all know cauliflower has gotten expensive. Would love to hear how much you can get cauliflower for where you are! Also, are they the normal small size or the really big size (i don’t see too many of these anymore). Please share, and enjoy!

You may feel skeptical about using the word “love” to describe one’s relationship to the cauliflower, but you can easily fall in love with how simple it is to create something delicious using Indian spices with this recipe. The recipe is from American Masala, the cook book I have recommended in previous posts and the link to which you can find on my side bar. I am not even sure what I did qualifies as cooking…I used one bowl to combine several spices with oil, then coated the cauliflower pieces (with onion) and then baked in a baking dish at 450 degrees for 45 minutes. How easy was that? Super easy and super fragrant. Be sure to pause to revel in the spices after they ground and after they are mixed into the oil.

Cardamon Roasted Cauliflower

Here are the spices. Feel free to ask me any questions about them:

• Cardamom pods (green), 3
• Coriander seeds, 1 tbspn
• Cumin seeds, 1 tspn
• Dried red chilies, 3 (I used about a half teaspoon of red pepper flakes)
• Whole peppercorns, 1/2 tsp

Put all of this in a coffee grinder (or small food processor) until you have a fine powder. Then measure 1/3 cup of EVOO into a bowl. I used, as viewers of this blog know, grapeseed oil as substitution. I don’t mind using EVOO in this, just don’t have any on hand right now. Mix the spices into the oil (and inhale…). Then toss your cut up florets into the mixture and coat. Saran (the author) uses one whole head of cauliflower plus 1 medium size onion (sliced finely). Coat thoroughly and then place the vegetables in a baking tray and roast until they are tender at 450 degrees. He says about an hour and I found it was done in about 45 to 50 minutes. Sprinkle with kosher salt and serve. I wonder if it would add flavor to it if you chopped up an herb like cilantro finely and also mixed it in the oil/spice mix. Even without it, the flavors just pop in your mouth. I do love that part of the American Masala style!

Price per serving: for a generous serving I would say $0.71 cents a serving. This includes the price of the cauliflower and the oil, the two prime ingredients. It is a tad expensive and its because cauliflower is expensive and I used organic cauliflower to boot. As usual, the price doesn’t include spices because I do believe these are an investment unless you are able to buy them in bulk. (In which case, more power to YOU). Any suggestions on how to lower the price are welcome.