Roasted Cauliflower with Hazelnuts and Pomegranate

Perfect Combo of Veggies, Fruit, Herbs, and Nuts

Recipe adapted from Live Earth Farm

Only a master chef could conceive of putting cauliflower together with smoky hazelnuts, crunchy greens, bright pomegranate, vinegar, and sweet spices. This particular master chef, Rebecca Mastoris, is also a caterer, Bauman College cooking instructor, and popular speaker with over 40 years of culinary experience. As if that weren’t enough, she also writes recipes for our CSA Live Earth Farm. Her unusual cauliflower dish features both well-balanced flavor and a colorful, festive appearance that adds eye-appeal to the table. In addition, it’s served at room temperature, so no need to stress about keeping it hot or cold. Try it at a holiday potluck, and you’ll likely see it disappear quickly, as I did last week. And get ready for some compliments!

Sautéed Cauliflower

No Longer the Great White Veggie

Recipe by Alice Waters

Cauliflower, the other white vegetable. Lacking the comfort value of potatoes, and not particularly exciting, I think of it as a sort of albino broccoli. But leave it to Alice Waters, seasonal chef and founder of the legendary Chez Panisse to come up with a cauliflower dish that’s not only colored delicately golden, but that’s easy, quick, and requires minimal ingredients. In her cookbook The Art of Simple Food, Ms. Waters makes a simple sauté sound positively sexy: “Sautéing is an exciting cooking experience. All your senses are engaged with the high heat, the loud sizzle of the pan, the active stirring and tossing, and the delightful smells of browning food…” Now who wouldn’t want to experience all that in the kitchen, especially if only three ingredients were needed?

Chili Spiced Romanesco Cauliflower with Tomatoes

Chili Tomato Cauliflower

Recipe by Robin

Romanesco cauliflower, what’s not to like? It’s bright chartreuse color, treelike shape, and dark green (edible!) leaves are a feast for the winter-weary eye. And it’s the only fractal vegetable that I know of. Go ahead and get out the magnifying glass. You’ll see the pattern, technically a recursive helical arrangement of cones, repeat down to the smallest segment. Since a vegetable has a finite number of cells, this is an imperfect fractal, but more precious than a perfect computer generated fractal because it has power to nourish our bodies as well as our minds.