Turkish Chicken Yogurtlu Kebobs and Cauliflower Salad

Sometime last fall Alex and I tried a Turkish restaurant called Peri Ela on the Upper East Side based on a recommendation from a friend.  The food there was pretty good, but my absolute favorite dish that we had there that evening was a dish called yogurtlu chicken adana (which the menu described as "spicy ground chicken, sliced and served over yogurt-garlic and pita bread").  I was essentially picturing a wrap/open-faced sandwich or pizza of some sort, but it was so much better than that.  The pita bread was toasted and cut or torn into large croutons and then topped with spicy chicken kebobs, onions and peppers and a garlicky-yogurt sauce.  The croutons soaked up the juices from the chicken kebobs and the sauteed onions and and peppers but still retained some of their crunch and texture.  The chicken kebobs themselves were nice and flavorful.  It was totally spicy, creamy and delicious.  Sunday afternoon I picked up some Turkish bread from Zabars and immediately starting thinking about trying to recreate that yogurtlu chicken adana with the bread.  Seeing as I am far from an expert on Turkish food I tried to find a recipe to follow online but I couldn't find any.  I found plenty of lamb or beef kebob yogurtlu recipes but nothing with chicken.  So I decided to just make something up.  I always like  yogurt-marinated chicken so step 1 was marinating the chicken in labneh, herbs and spices.  Step 2 really winging it since I couldn't find a really good recipe to follow.  We did take inspiration from the various lamb or beef kebob yogurtlu recipes but from that point we basically threw in whatever ingredients seemed to make sense. 

Given that I basically had no idea what I was doing here, I thought the end result was surprisingly successful.  The chicken itself was my least favorite part (next time I will tweak the marinade to make it more flavorful or make chicken adana), but the pide soaked in the tomato sauce and yogurt sauce was pretty delicious.  While we were eating Alex and I both came to the conclusion that next time we might want to cook the chicken 90% of the way and then add the bread, chicken and tomato sauce to a shallow casserole or baking dish and throw it in the oven for a few minutes.  I think that way the bread will absorb more flavor and the dish will just meld together a little better.  Even if I don't bake the combined dish in the oven, I will serve the dish in shallow bowl or baking dish because serving it on a plate is just asking for trouble.  As Alex and I tried to toss the bread, chicken and sauces all together it was a battle to keep everything on the plate and not fling chicken, etc. everywhere.  While our execution wasn't perfect, the flavors were pretty good.  I thought the combination of the tangy-ness from the yogurt sauce, the sweetness and slight smoky flavor from the tomato sauce and the heat from the cayenne in the butter sauce worked really nicely together.  I was worried that the cauliflower salad would be too heavy/dense to serve with the kebobs but it was surprisingly light.  I really liked the lemony dressing, which was bright and fresh but not too acidic.  I also liked the slight hint of heat of the crushed red pepper flakes.

Recipes after the jump!

Cauliflower-Feta Fritters with Pomegranate

I really love a good fritter but I am often disappointed in the fritters we make at home.  We have made a few different versions of zucchini fritters at home (here and here) and both times I found the texture of the fritters to be disappointing.  They were soggy and a little oily.  Even when the flavor of the fritters is perfect (like it was with these Sweet Potato and Kimchi Pancakes), I just can't get them to crisp up enough.  One exception to our fritter disappointments was this Thai recipe for Corn Fritters.  They were delicious and had great texture.  Somehow our fritter disappointments haven't in any way dissuaded me from making more fritter attempts.  This version was among the most successful and I think I have discovered the trick to making fritters at home - you don't want a batter per se.  Instead you want a mixture that barely holds together with chunks of vegetable and just enough flour and egg to bind the fritters together.  All of our fritter failures have featured batters with more liquid than vegetable (or included watery vegetables like zucchini).  And that is totally where we went wrong.  This recipe made for a very thick batter that had almost no liquid to it at all.  It was almost like a chunky dough rather than a batter.  Of course that type of consistency makes the fritters a little more delicate because they have so little filler.  They are hard to flip and don't hold together particularly well, but the flavor and texture of the cooked fritters are both excellent.  The fritters tasted gloriously cauliflower-y.  I liked the flavors of garlic, lemon and salty feta.  I also thought that the contrast of the heat from the cayenne and crushed red pepper flakes against the smoky cumin-flavored yogurt and the sweetness of the pomegranate seeds made for a really interesting and flavorful dish. 

Recipe after the jump!

Roast Cauliflower and Arugula Salad with Bacon

What do you do when you know you are going to be traveling constantlyfor the next 2-3 weeks and (1) your fridge is full of random vegetables and (2) you know that due to traveling you will be eating burgers and chili on the mountain in California/Nevada, BBQ in Texas and other heavy meals, rather than salads and seafood?  If you're anything like me, you make random salads and/or random roast vegetables.  Or you get lazy and combine the two and top a bed of baby arugula with roast cauliflower.  And when you discover that you have some bacon left over from the Bacon Braised Cabbage you throw that in there too.  Sometimes my randomness works out and sometimes it just doesn't.  Luckily, this salad ended up working out really well.  There were a lot of textures and flavors that came together beautifully to make a nice salad.  Roasting the cauliflower in a 425 degree oven for 45 minutes made it nice and nutty and sweet and the sweetness was further augmented by the shallots and a scant teaspoon of honey.  The crispy bacon added a hit of wonderful smoky, porky flavor, which made the salad feel warm and rich.  Then there was the hit of acidity from the red wine vinegar, the peppery flavor of the arugula and the butteriness of lightly toasted pine nuts.  It was a winner for me - fulfilling the dual goals of clearing out the fridge and providing me with a moderately healthy (it would have been much healthier had we omitted the bacon, but bacon makes everything better) meal.

Recipe after the jump!

Roast Romanesco Cauliflower with Chistorras

A few weeks ago we picked up some chistorras at Despana and we had to figure out what to do with them.  We served them one night with cheese and crackers and then I had to think of another use for them.  Since chistorras remind me of chorizo I decided to use them like I would use chorizo and roast with vegetables.  We had a head of romanesco caluflower in the fridge so I figured why not roast the chistorras with the romanesco cauliflower.  So we tossed the cauliflower with the usual assortment of ingredients - evoo, crushed red pepper flakes, s&p - and roasted them halfway before throwing in the chistorras.  I had never tried romanesco cauliflower on its own before but it was a really interesting and eye-opening experience.  I took my first bite of the romanesco cauliflower and was instantly stumped.  It tasted like popcorn to me.  I can't explain it.  It had a very different texture from normal cauliflower (a little more delicate) and the taste was much sweeter and perhaps a touch nuttier.  The chistorras added a nice porky, spicy (not in the sense that it was hot, but more in the sense that it had a lot of flavor and spices) flavor, which gave the dish some real depth of flavor.  And the lemon added that hit of acid and brightness to balance out the richness of the chistorras and the sweetness of the romanesco cauliflower.  I thought it was really cool combination.  And I was intrigued enough by it that I couldn't resist picking up another head of romanesco cauliflower for further experimentation!

Recipe after the jump!

Cauliflower Curry

I'm currently at the tail end of a cauliflower obsession.  Every fall I go through a cauliflower phase where I buy oodles of it at the farmers' market.  And then I have to take a break because it gets a little monotonous after awhile.  We have another head of cauliflower in the fridge right now (romanesco cauliflower to be precise) so I was trying to come up with two very distinct recipes for the cauliflower.  I picked this one because it seemed interesting and it was very different from all of the other recipes that I was considering.  I'm hoping that the other cauliflower recipe turns out better than this one because truth be told, I was a little disappointed in this dish.  The cauliflower was mushy and the balance of flavors just seemed off to me.  Alex thought it was missing something, whereas I thought the flavor of the coriander was a little overpowering (I would definitely reduce the amount of coriander seeds) and the dish tasted really sweet.  I actually asked Alex if he added sugar, but it was just the sweetness of the onions and the cauliflower itself.  All in all it tasted a little... uneven?  I don't think the flavors melded as harmoniously as I thought they would.  Anytime you use cumin seeds and coriander seeds rather than the ground variety you run the risk that some bites will have a surplus of spice, while others will have little to none.  This recipe suffered a lot because of it.  So you would have some really sweet bites, others with a burst of floral/peppery coriander flavor and others with a hint of smokeyness from the cumin.  But I didn't have a single bite that successfully blended all of those flavors.  And then there was the texture, which I found slightly off-putting.  Note to self - roast cauliflower is way more my speed than stewed cauliflower.  I love the crunch of roast cauliflower and the richer flavor of the caramelized florets, whereas I don't particularly love the mushy texture of stewed cauliflower.

P.S.  I have been a little swamped at work the past couple of weeks so I am a wee bit behind on my posts.  More will be forthcoming as soon as I have time to put them up - I promise.  I have some new Vietnamese and Thai recipes to post about, as well as a few others.  So stay tuned.

Recipe after the jump!

Sam Sifton's Roasted Cauliflower with Anchovy Bread Crumbs

The week  leading up to Thanksgiving we ended up eating a lot of random vegetarian meals.  It just seemed like the proper (and healthy) thing to do since we knew we would be stuffing ourselves silly on Thanksgiving.  And logically, some of those vegetarian meals were based on recipes that I had considered making as a side dish for Thanksgiving, but didn't quite make the cut.  Before I go any further I should state that this dish was only in the running because Serious Eats raved about it.  It didn't actually go with anything else we were serving (more on that later) but it sounded interesting enough that I bookmarked it as an option if we changed up the menu (we didn't).  Once I knew our menu was set and this dish wasn't going to make it onto the Thanksgiving table, I decided to try it out on just Alex and I.  Our end verdict was that while the cauliflower was pretty good, it wasn't as good as other cauliflower dishes we have made in the past - in terms of texture and flavor.  The bread crumbs did provide a promised hit of "salty-funky" flavor, but I felt like you didn't taste the sage or the lemon.  I also thought the bread crumbs weren't quite as delicious as I had hoped.  As I mentioned below, they were a little oily and gummy, rather than crispy and flavorful.  If I were to make this dish again I would substitute the bread crumbs and the almonds from Mario Batali's St. John's Eve Pasta for the bread crumbs here.  And then I would probably roast the cauliflower much longer - like we did with the Roasted Cauliflower with Turmeric and Cumin a few weeks ago.  Roasting it longer would provide the wonderful sweet, nutty flavor and crispy texture that I really enjoyed with that dish.  To be perfectly honest, with all of the changes I would have to make to this dish before I would make it again I'm not sure there will be a re-do, but such is life.  It wasn't a bad dish.  It just wasn't anything to write home about, nor was it a dish that I would be dying to serve to my family for future Thanksgivings...

Recipe after the jump!

Roasted Cauliflower with Turmeric and Cumin

I have never roasted cauliflower this long - when we roast cauliflower we tend to only roast it for about 30 minutes, which often results in tender, but slightly soggy cauliflower.  I was worried that roasting it this long would result in bitter, overly charred cauliflower.  But it resulted in sweet, crispy, slightly nutty cauliflower.  And when the roast cauliflower itself is that tasty, you don't need a lot of seasonings and flavors.  For this entire head of cauliflower there was less than 2 tsp of spices - the majority of which was cumin.  And yet, the cauliflower ended up tasting buttery and spicy (although the spicy flavor was not unexpected given the red pepper flakes) and not smoky.  I thought it would need some acid, perhaps a squeeze of fresh lemon juice, but it didn't.  The fresh mint and cilantro provided the perfect fresh counterpoint, while the toasted pine nuts provided some nice crunch.  From now on, I am totally going to roast my cauliflower for an hour (provided that it doesn't contain any garlic or anything else that could burn and turn bitter) so it gets that whole sweet, nutty and crispy texture and flavor.

Recipe after the jump!

Roast Brussels Sprouts and Cauliflower with Maple Syrup, Bacon and Cayenne

We found ourselves in the interesting position yesterday afternoon of having a half serving each of cauliflower and brussels sprouts in the fridge left over from the Brussels Sprout Fried Rice with Crispy Cauliflower.  I was trying to figure out how to use those vegetables individually (I was going to make a pizza with the brussels sprouts and some bacon or speck), but I couldn't figure out what I wanted to do with the pretty yellow cauliflower.  And then I decided, why not throw them both together and roast them in a single dish.  Genius.  My initial thought was to make a riff on the Momofuku Roasted Cauliflower with Fish Sauce Vinaigrette and make a batch that included both brussels sprouts and cauliflower.  We make that recipe with both ingredients separately, why wouldn't it work with them combined?  Easy peasy.  But we didn't have mint or Rice Krispies and we had a nice piece of slab bacon in the refrigerator just begging to be used.  So I decided to roast the veggies with bacon, maple syrup and cayenne.  Alex asked if I wanted to add garlic and/or onion, but I decided that I wanted to keep it as simple as possible.  I really liked our roast veggies - but then again, I always like roast veggies (particularly roast brussels sprouts and cauliflower).  And just like always, Alex liked the veggies but wasn't as happy with them as I was.  He doesn't mind roast veggies, but unlike me he never really craves them.  I really like the combination of sweet, salty and spicy flavors in this dish.  My love for those flavor combinations shouldn't be any surprise to anyone since I have made a number of brussels sprouts dishes with bacon and various spicy sauces in the past.  It's not as spicy, exotic or audaciously flavored as the Fatty 'Cue Brussels Sprouts or the Brussels Sprouts with Kimchi Puree and Bacon, but our was tasty and a lot easier to put together. 

Recipe after the jump!

Brussels Sprout Fried Rice with Crispy Cauliflower

Alex disagrees with me on this - but this dish was my favorite thing we have made all week.  He preferred the Fish-Fragrant Eggplant (Yu Xiang Qie Zi). And it was vegan!  I'm not saying that I want to be vegan (or vegetarian for that matter), but I thought it bore mentioning that this recipe is vegan.  Alex said he would have liked the dish more if we added some finely chopped egg pancake (which we briefly considered doing until we realized that we were out of eggs).  I get where he is coming from, but I don't think the lack of egg hurt the dish at all.  I think the addition of egg would be tasty, but I don't know that it would unduly improve the recipe for me.  My favorite thing about the dish was that the flavors were simple, but fantastic - slightly spicy, salty and full of vegetable goodness.  This is the type of dish I would make for myself all the time if Alex weren't around - I love plates or bowls full of roasted vegetables.  And brussels sprouts and cauliflower are among my absolute favorites.  Instead I have to settle for eating this kind of dish occasionally because it's not really his thing.  He is a good sport about it, but there are other dishes (most of them Asian, pork-based or spicy) that he would prefer.  But that's ok.  I just have to sneak in my roasted vegetable fixes at lunch since he is not around!

Recipe after the jump!

Cauliflower Soup with Cheddar, Cayenne and Torn Croutons

I am clearly in a soup frame of mind.  We had soup Monday night for dinner and I can't stop thinking about making more soup for dinner tonight.  It's a soup obsession.  I want soup, soup and more soup.  And this weekend in Maine I am thinking about chowder.  Or chowda.  And lobster.  I can't wait to eat some lobster.  Maybe a nice lobster bisque is in order...  Anyway, this cauliflower soup was a wonderful weeknight meal because it is easy to put together and doesn't require a lot of ingredients.  The cheese made it rich without the need for heavy cream, although it does mask the flavor of the cauliflower itself a little.  As a side note, I have a really hard time putting heavy cream in my soups at home.  I don't mind ordering soups that I know are cream-based at restaurants, but somehow making them at home just seems wrong.  The soup was warm and comforting, with a little kick from the cayenne sprinkled on top.  And for the record, the reason our cayenne doesn't look like the ground cayenne you usually see at the grocery store is because it didn't come from a grocery store.  This cayenne is from the batch of home grown and home dried chilis that John gave us in Cincinnati.  It rocks.  And I decided not to throw the croutons on top because I really wanted you to see the cayenne (and not just more beige), but you have to make them with this soup.  They really add a nice crunch and a lovely garlicky/buttery flavor.  Yum.

Recipe after the jump!

Simple Roasted Cauliflower with Garlic, Onion and Anchovies

I got the idea to make this cauliflower because I feel like the flavor combination of anchovies, evoo, garlic, crushed red pepper flakes and parsley go together really nicely.  We have made all sorts of dishes (mostly pastas, but other things too) with that combination of flavors.  We did a Roast Broccolini with Parsley, Garlic and Anchovies awhile back that was delicious.  We also made a really nice Seared Radish Crostini awhile back that I really enjoyed.  So I decided why not use that flavor combination with another vegetable that I love?  So we made a flavorful paste of anchovies, garlic, onion, crushed red pepper flakes and evoo and then roasted our cauliflower in the oven.  This roasted cauliflower is the type of dish that I used to make a ton before Alex moved in.  It was pretty common for me to just roast up half of a cauliflower or a bunch of brussels sprouts with whatever seasonings, meats and aromatics that I had in the fridge and eat that for dinner.  Sometimes I would add pasta, sometimes I would just eat a big old bowl full of roasted veggies.  But then Alex moved up and those random roast vegetable meals just sort of disappeared.  In case you were wondering, my other default meal was scrambled eggs, which I continue to make fairly regularly on the weekend for brunch/lunch and for myself when Alex is either out of town or has other dinner plans.  So I would totally make this cauliflower dish again for dinner sometimes.  I might substitute bacon (or capers if you wanted to go the vegetarian route) for the anchovies or play with the proportions a little, but this is totally my kind of dish.  Alex was less enthusiastic about it.  He said that he didn't taste the anchovies, garlic and onion as much as he wanted.  I agree with him to a certain extent.  The dominant flavors were definitely crushed red pepper flakes, lemon juice and parsley (although my portion was more heavily parsley-ed than his because I love parsley), but I thought the salty/nutty flavor of the anchovies came through nonetheless. 

Recipe after the jump!

Penne with Cauliflower and Bacon

Sorry everyone.  I know I have been a little delinquent.  Again.  But in my defense, last week was a very busy week at work (although we did find time to cook a few meals that I am finally getting around to posting now).  So I'm hoping to get three posts up today - this pasta, some skirt steak tacos, and a yummy quinoa, spinach and mushroom dish.  If you have the time, stay tuned for more posts!

I'm posting this pasta recipe first because I think of the dishes we have made in the few weeks, this one made me the happiest.  It was a combination of items in our fridge/pantry - leftover homemade Italian-Style Bread Crumbs, pasta, bacon, parsley and cauliflower.  And have I mentioned that I have been obsessed with cauliflower lately?  No?  Well I totally am.  It's delicious.  And I am equally obsessed with those Italian-Style Bread Crumbs.  They are fairly easy to make and make such a difference in your cooking.  Anyway, this pasta was quite tasty and easy to put together, which made me very happy.  We just threw together a bunch of ingredients in the fridge/pantry and voila!  The combination of flavors really worked together nicely.  In each bite you got a little heat from the red pepper flakes, some salty bite from the cheese and the bacon, the wonderful porky flavor of the bacon, and a punch of flavor and texture from the bread crumbs.  Yum.  It was a fantastically hearty, yet delicious dish, one that I will definitely make again in the future. 

Recipes after the jump!

Cauliflower Soup with Pecorino Romano and Truffle Oil

Somehow Monday has become the night of white soup.  Last week we made congee and this week, cauliflower soup.  I'm not sure where I got the bee in my bonnet, but I have been wanting to make cauliflower soup for some time now.  I think my obsession with cauliflower soup stemmed from a shot glass full of truffle-scented cauliflower soup that we were served as an amuse bouche at Eighty-One almost two years ago.  It was such a lovely mouthful of soup that I have been thinking about it ever since.  I have had cauliflower soup served as an amuse at other restaurants as well (it seems to be a rather common amuse bouche here in NYC), but none were quite as good as that first one.  Speaking of Eighty-One, I'm still pretty depressed that it closed.  Moving on.  I have been on the lookout for a recipe that looked easy, but flavorful.  I have to say that the truffle oil is what did it for me here.  I love the combination of truffle oil and cauliflower.  And I love bacon with cauliflower.  So it sounded like the best combination of recipes/flavors ever!  But I'm not sure that bacon, cauliflower and truffle oil were the most successful combination in this soup.  The entire soup was imbued with this subtle bacon-y flavor (which I usually love), but thought that it was too much like every other soup we make with bacon in it.  It didn't stand out and didn't work as well with the truffle oil.  It also overpowered the subtle flavor of the cauliflower.  The entire pot of soup just tasted like any really rich, creamy, slightly bacon-y soup.  It could almost have been loaded baked potato soup (or whatever that soup is called), except for the occasional whiff of the truffle oil.  I think if I were to make the soup again I would leave the bacon out entirely and try to coax out more flavor from the cheese and truffle oil.  I would also roast the cauliflower, rather than simmering it in the stock, to intensify the flavor of the cauliflower itself.  I also think that the soup would be improved (both aesthetically and flavor-wise) by the addition of some fresh chives sprinkled on top. 

Sadly, this soup didn't make much of a lasting impression, but it did teach me some valuable lessons about cauliflower soup.  I guess I will have to keep looking for the perfect cauliflower soup recipe - one that can live up to the memory of that cauliflower soup at Eighty-One.

Recipe after the jump!

Cumin Seed Roasted Cauliflower with Yogurt

In case you couldn't tell, I am still clearly in the midst of my cauliflower obsession.  But this is our last cauliflower dish for the week.  I think.  I try to plan out all of my meals for the week over the weekend, but I rarely stick to my plan.  Sometimes I just can't find an ingredient and end up scrapping or revamping a dish.  Sometimes I end up picking up some random ingredients that I have to cook ASAP that bump another dish off the menu.  And then sometimes work comes up and messes up my plans.  This week I wasn't exactly sure what I wanted to do towards the end of the week, but everything came together really well.  I picked up a bunch of nice fish at Citarella on Tuesday and I really wanted to cook some of it.  So we had the striped bass on Tuesday and on Friday we cooked up some Salt and Pepper Salmon to go with this cauliflower.  I had originally intended for this cauliflower dish to go with a nice bowl of stracciatella soup, but since we made Smoky Shrimp, Hominy and Tortilla Soup on Thursday and I bought those nice organic salmon fillets we went with the salmon instead.

This recipe came from one of the cooking blogs that I read regularly - Smitten Kitchen.  The blog always has beautiful pictures and wonderful recipes.  This recipe was featured recently and I knew I had to make it because it incorporated a lot of flavors that I know work together well.  I really liked this cauliflower dish just like I thought I would.  It had a lot of interesting flavors that worked together very nicely.  I wouldn't say that it was my favorite cauliflower dish that we have ever made, but if I had to give it a letter grade I would give it at A-. I told Alex that this was the type of dish that if I happened to have the ingredients in the apartment (or if I happened to be at the grocery store conceptualizing dinner and picking up a few necessary things) I would be excited and happy to make it again, but I might not make a special trip to the grocery store to pick up ingredients specifically for it.  I think that make sense.  It made sense in my head.

Recipe after the jump!

Cauliflower and Feta Omelet

I'm going through a bit of a cauliflower phase right now.  Every time I go to the farmers' market I end up picking up some more cauliflower, or I have to talk myself out of doing so.   I keep waiting for broccoflower/Romanesco broccoli to show up but I never see it.  A few weeks ago one of the vendors there told me they should have it in 2 weeks, but no such luck.  So I picked up another head of cauliflower today and we decided to use some of it today for this omelet, but save some later for roasting.  The reason we made this omelet tonight is that one of our best friends was visiting for the weekend and we gorged ourselves all weekend on Asian food - ramen, soba, yakitori and Fatty Crab.  We also had bagels, lots of cookies and chocolate.  I needed to reboot my system with some veggies and I didn't want to spend a lot of time in the kitchen.  So we made an omelet with the cauliflower, plus some parsley and free-range eggs, all of which came from the farmers' market.

This omelet is really easy and really filling.  It also cooks up in a flash.  Neither Alex nor I was particularly hungry this evening for dinner so we shared the omelet and that was plenty for both of us.  We were originally going to make a beet salad with it, but once we ate the omelet we decided to save the beets for tomorrow night.  Since the omelet is so simple, you really have to like the ingredients that go into it.  If you're not a fan of cauliflower, feta or parsley, don't bother.  You could try it with another type of cheese - maybe some romano cheese that you grate into the omelet while it is setting, rather than just sprinkling it over the top once you remove it from the pan.  Or you could season the cauliflower with some garlic and smoked paprika and take it a more Spanish direction with manchego.  There are a lot of options if you want to adapt the recipe to your own preferences.  I thought that sometimes the feta overwhelmed the rest of the dish, whereas Alex found the parsley a little overwhelming.  Both ingredients have pretty intense flavors so if you get a big old bite full of parsley or feta it can be a fairly serious jolt.  It's not necessarily a bad thing, but I think if I make the omelet again I will probably play with the proportions a little and try different cheeses and/or herbs.

Recipe after the jump!

Momofuku Roasted Cauliflower with Fish Sauce Vinaigrette

In my book, this is one of the absolute best ways to prepare cauliflower.  It's not exactly quick and easy (you have to deep fry cilantro for Pete's sake), but it's so delicious that it is all worth it.  And if you compare the recipe against the other recipes in the Momofuku cookbook, it's really not all that labor intensive.  Some of those recipes are complicated beyond all comprehension.  But man some of them are amazing.  Living in NYC where all of the restaurants are located, there is no need for me to attempt most of the recipes at home when I can just wander down to the East Village and have them in all of their glory.  But some of the recipes (like this one) are definitely worth making the effort of making them at home.  And like I said, this recipe is not as bad as most.

When you are roasting the cauliflower you are going to want to add some salt.  I know I wanted to.  Don't.  It goes against everything I believe in when roasting or cooking to not add salt.  But the fish sauce vinaigrette that you douse the cauliflower in after it roasts will provide more than enough salt and flavor.  Cauliflower is particularly good at soaking up bold flavors.  I'm not sure that the fried cilantro provides anything significant to the dish, but it sure looks cool.  You already get plenty of fresh cilantro flavor from the cilantro stems.  The Rice Krispies tossed in the shichimi togarashi on the other hand add flavor and texture to the cauliflower.  When you combine all of the ingredients together it equals an amazing dish - you have nutty cauliflower, heat, salt, texture, acidity and the brightness of the herbs.  Delicious.

Recipes after the jump!

Roasted Cauliflower Salad with Watercress, Walnuts and Gruyere

Sometimes I feel the need for vegetables.  Lots and lots of vegetables.  Tonight was one of those nights, inspired by a recipe I found in the NY Times yesterday that was published on NYE.  So here I go again with meals that aren't 100% seasonally appropriate (although I would argue that the roasted cauliflower makes the salad particularly hearty and therefore, appropriate when it's a balmy 38 degrees outside).  I was planning on making some butternut squash soup with the salad for a soup-salad combo, but then I decided the salad should be meal enough on its own given that there are only two of us and the salad included an entire head of cauliflower.  I don't know about you, but that's more than enough food for me.

I would place this salad in the solid like category.  I like all of the components, peppery watercress, creamy nutty gruyere, slightly sweet and still nutty roasted cauliflower, crunchy toasted walnuts, and buttery evoo.  I even think they come together nicely.  But this salad is comforting, rather than exciting - the type of meal that makes you feel warm and happy, but doesn't make you want to jump up and down in glee over discovering your new favorite meal.

Recipe after the jump!

Cardamom and Black Pepper Chicken

This chicken is delicious.  Super delicious.  And so was the cauliflower.  I know I usually babble on for awhile about how I chose the recipe, etc., but this time I just had to say something about how good the chicken was before I babbled.  Now on to the babbling.

The only Indian cookbook I have ever owned is by Madhur Jaffrey.  Several years ago when I first moved to NYC, I visited Kalustyans and asked the Indian ladies working there for a recommendation on a good Indian cookbook.  They pointed out Indian Cooking by Madhur Jaffrey in a split second.  So I bought it.  And all of the recipes I have tried from it (with the exception of one) have been delicious.  So at the library the other day I saw another one of Madhur Jaffrey's cookbooks, From Curries to Kebabs: Recipes from the Indian Spice Trail so I checked it out.  And then proceeded to go through the cookbook, flagging all of the recipes I wanted to try.  This recipe for Cardamom and Black Pepper Chicken was one of the ones that first caught my eye.  And then I thought while I was at it, I should try one of the cauliflower recipes that had also caught my eye.  So our meal of Cardamom and Black Pepper Chicken with Quick Cauliflower Bhaji was born.  I also served it with plain basmati rice and naan (not homemade unfortunately).  Yum.  Both the chicken and the cauliflower had some spice to them, but not an overwhelming amount.  The heat level was lingering and meshed well with the various spices, cumin and coriander in particular.  In the case of the chicken, the spice was additionally balanced against the perfume of the cardamom, the sweetness of the cinnamon, and the tang of the fresh lemon juice.  Very tasty.  I considered making some cilantro chutney with the meal to give it some additional freshness and color, but decided against it.  In the future I might top the chicken with some roughly chopped cilantro because I just love cilantro and otherwise the meal is a study in beige, but it certainly didn't need it flavor-wise. 

Alex kept stopping mid-bite and saying how pleased he was with the meal.  You know it's good when your husband stopped eating long enough to compliment you and/or your food.  Several times.  What can I say?  I'm just that good.  Or Madhur Jaffrey is.

Recipes after the jump!

Seared Sea Bass with Pan-Roasted Cauliflower

So I have been taking a photography class to learn how to take pictures with my new fancy camera.  And in this class we take pictures in black and white.  When Alex grabbed the camera to take pictures of dinner tonight he didn't notice that the camera was set to black and white (or that it was set to manual mode), so now we have black and white pictures of our seared bass.  Oops.  Now, if the problem had been reversed and we had color pictures when we wanted black and white the camera could just alter the image to make it black and white.  Unfortunately, when you start with a picture in black and white the reverse is not possible.  Somehow he managed to get close to proper exposure and everything with the camera in manual without knowing anything about F-stops and shutter speeds, purely through dumb luck.  Then again, the last pictures I took were indoor with bright studio spotlights, so that's pretty close to the conditions under which the sea bass photos were shot.  Either way, my apologies for the black and white photo!

I love few things more than a properly cooked piece of fish - particularly one with a nice crispy skin.  Sure meat is great, but in my opinion fish is way better, not to mention harder to cook.  I would be perfectly happy with this piece of seared Montauk sea bass over cauliflower in almost any restaurant.  Perhaps not a Jean Georges level restaurant or Marea, but nearly anywhere else.  It was lovely.  Fresh, lively and perfectly crispy.  Alex said the fish was on the same level as the short ribs, but I think it was on a completely different level.  This is one of my favorite meals that I have prepared recently.  And that is saying a lot.  I loved it!  So amazing.  If you love sea bass, you will love this dish.

Recipe after the jump!

Indian Lamb Chops with Curried Cauliflower

After this weekend we have been on an Indian kick.  A few weeks ago I came across this recipe in the January issue of Bon Appetit and decided that I had to try it.  I rarely get the chance to cook lamb, and this looked too good to pass up (with a few modifications of course).  Seeing as we finally have all of the necessary ingredients (our lack of mango chutney had been holding me up), I decided to pull the trigger on the recipe.

I have never tried cooking lamb shoulder blade chops, and in the future I might substitute lamb rib chops, or even a rack of lamb for the shoulder blade chops.  The shoulder blade chops were a little fatty and had lots of bone and other undesirable chewy bits.  Even with the somewhat strange meat choice, this dish was really nice.  The curried cauliflower is seriously delicious.  Alex said that he would serve the curried cauliflower over, or with, any kind of meat, including chicken, beef or lamb.  I think it tastes great with the rich fattiness of lamb, but would also be delicious as a side dish on its own.  This dish would be lovely served with spiced rice.

Recipe after the jump!