Colly Flour

And the questionable origin of Coke

Dear Readers,

After making a delicious cauliflower steak last week, which you’ll see below, I was curious to see more of what this seemingly vapid, cruciferous vegetable was capable of.

I grew up thinking only the worst things about cauliflower: devoid of taste, weird mouth texture, gets cold suspiciously quickly, etc.. And not to mention my Mom’s scathing indictment of it based on the fact that it’s not green.

You know what they say: “If it ain’t green I ain’t keen”, or “No green in the veg no allegiance do I pledge.” (No one says these things, except my childhood brain.)

It turns out that my childhood prejudice against cauliflower wasn’t entirely misplaced. A side-by-side comparison of the inherent nutritional benefits between cauliflower and broccoli ranks broccoli the champ in nearly every category.

That being said, cauliflower’s competitive advantages come moreso from it’s lumpy, rotund structure and less from its nutritional benefits.

Can you make a broccoli steak? I guess, but blegh.

Can you turn broccoli florets into a vegan imitation of chicken wings? I’ll pass.

Man, I could really go for some broccoli rice, amiright? No one has ever said this.

Hence, some recipes that showcase cauliflower’s voluptuous assets.

(PS - it’s phonetically pronounced kaa-luh-flau-ur, but sometimes colly-flour just rolls off the tongue nicely.)

CAULIFLOWER TOAST WITH ROMESCO SAUCE

Quick lil snack with a delicious Romesco sauce, which is a tomato and roasted red pepper-based sauce.

ROASTED CAULIFLOWER STEAK

Learn to make your own cauliflower steak! Is this “steak” just a vessel for whatever sauces and toppings you serve it with? Yes. Is that okay? Yes.

TURMERIC-SPICED WHOLE ROASTED CAULIFLOWER

If you have a flair for the dramatic and are looking to convince some cooking plebs of your culinary prowess, this is basically an edible art installation.

FROM THE KITCHEN

In an effort to put more vegetable-forward dishes on my household’s non-existent kitchen table, I decided to make a cauliflower steak:

Calling this a steak is obviously a misnomer, and simply describes a thick center cut from a whole head of cauliflower.

Cauliflower sears more nicely than you might expect, and when plated on a generous smear of whipped goat cheese and topped with chimichurri, the result is kind of obnoxious. In a good way.

FOOD FACTS

• Mark Twain once famously quipped that “a cauliflower is nothing but a cabbage with a college education.”

• John Pemberton, the creator of Coca-Cola, became addicted to morphine after being wounded in the American Civil War. In order to break his addiction, he created a painkiller out of a mix of cocaine and alcohol — two ingredients that are certainly not addictive. Later on he created a non-alcoholic version of his bootleg painkiller, which came to be known as Coca-Cola! There’s something hilarious to me about being addicted to one substance and breaking your addiction with other addictive substances. The 1800s were wild.

• Medical studies have revealed that isolated substances from cauliflower can prevent the development of certain types of cancer. Eat your non-greens!

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