Cauliflower Steaks and Pea Puree
Cauliflower Goes Up-Scale
(GF/ VEG/ VE)
My relationship with cauliflower has experienced a full 360. Growing up, I only knew cauliflower to be a stir-fry filler. Today, it’s one of the most glorified dishes in my kitchen!
I would often order it at restaurants as a main, yet would feel underwhelmed. So I decided to experiment at home.
One of the biggest misconceptions of vegan food is that it’s bland and non filling. But that couldn’t be more wrong. Take this dish for example, you’ve got the roasted cumin cauliflower, sweet potato fries which are filling and flavoursome, matched with creamy pea puree and crunchy roasted hazelnuts to top it all off.
There’s a lot of things going on but it works!
Ingredients
1 Cauliflower (large size)
2 Sweet Potatoes
2 cups Frozen Peas
1 cup Coconut Milk
Hazelnuts
Pomegranate
Fresh Parsley
2 cloves of garlic
1/4 onion (small to medium sized)
Spices and Condiments
Olive Oil, paprika, cumin, honey, S&P and mixed herbs.
Method
Sweet Potato Fries
These take the longest to cook, so get them in the oven first.
A Vegan Texture Party in Your Mouth!
1. CUT Sweet Potato into pieces shaped into fries. Optional to soak them in ice, this removes the moisture and helps with the crispiness. Remove after 15 minutes and pat down with tea towel.
2. SEASON with olive oil, paprika, mixed herbs.
3. GRILL for 40 minutes at 180 deg.
Note: You don’t have to soak them in ice, I just wanted to try this time because I read online that it would make them crispier. If you don’t have time, you can skip the ice bowl part.
Cauliflower Steaks
4. CUT Cauliflower into 4 pieces. The middle section will be your key piece for the dish, you should aim to get 2-3 pieces which are 4cm wide pieces.
5. SEASON both cauliflowers and hazelnuts with cumin, olive oil, mixed herbs.
6. GRILL grill for 30-40 mins at 180 degrees. After 20 minutes, turn them over. Keep an eye on them after 30 minutes, you want to the outsides browning, without burning them.
Step 5: Season Cauliflowers.
Roast the cauliflowers under the sweet potato fries.
Step 6: After 20 minutes, turn them over and add in the hazelnuts.
Pea Puree
Step 7: Blend Pea Puree Ingredients.
7. BLEND 2 cups of peas, 1 cup of coconut milk, handful of fresh parsley, garlic, onion and oil and S&P. Pour it into a pot and heat up once the cauliflowers are ready.
To Plate
8. START with the pea puree, heat up in a pot for 5-10 minutes. Take one scoop of pea puree and place on a plate. With the back of a spoon, make a circle with the puree which should be bigger than your largest cauliflower steak.
9. PLACE the largest cauliflower steak on top of the pea puree. Add one or two more pieces depending on the size of your plate.
10. GARNISH with the roasted hazelnuts, parsley and pomegranate. Add sweet potato fries on the side.
Pour in a pan and wait to heat it up 10 minutes before plating.
This was almost too pretty to eat. ALMOST. I love adding lots of colour and textures to dishes. For me, the secret weapon to this dish is the roasted hazelnuts. Next time I might roast them with za’atar (mix of cumin, sumac, coriander seeds, sesame seeds and thyme). A few of my friends have made this dish already, it’s lovely to see people cooking more veggies! Enjoy : )
Tips
Buy the biggest cauliflower available. This is so the ‘steaks’ stay together when you flip them. Once you roast the cauliflowers they can get crumbly.
You can pre-make the pea puree earlier in the day and just heat up when you’re ready to serve.
You can add a bit of honey all over the sweet potato fries after around 30 mins of roasting.