The Outcast

The cauliflower wants you to love it. It also wants to be a little flashier, a little more outrageous, a little more of a wild child. It just wants a little bit of attention, that's all.

Cauliflower is one of those vegetables that people love to hate. Kids love to shriek, Ugh! Cauliflower is disgusting! And, actually, a lot of adults like to also fitfully howl about the ways that cauliflower will most certainly bring suffering and death to everything it touches. It tends to fall into the same love-to-hate category as brussels sprouts and broccoli, and I suppose it makes sense, since they are in the same family, after all. Honestly, that poor, poor family is just trying to get noticed. It's just trying to prove that it's worthy of that space in your cart, that spot in your refrigerator drawer, that bit of your dinner plate, and, the most ideal venue, that space in your belly.

It's also one of those vegetables that lacks color, so adults tend to rationalize not eating it because it's white (and therefore, of course, not nutritious). At least brussels sprouts look healthy, and that can be inspiring in both eating and cooking. Cauliflower, though -- cauliflower looks like, well, not much. It's kind of like a brain that ended up in the bleach. Which is to say, not all that appetizing. Sometimes it turns up on crudité trays, and I've often even seen it all alone on that tray, once the carrots and peapods and red peppers have all been eaten. If vegetables could cry, cauliflower would sob.

We ate cauliflower growing up, but it would be dressed in its evening wear, a smooth gown of silky cheese sauce. If there's a way to make something look more appealing, you simply must dress it in cheese sauce. This technique is perfect for something that is regularly quite dull looking, like cauliflower, but also useful for other things that you wish to feel more attracted to, like another human, or a vitamin, or those outfits that dog show handlers wear.

The cheese sauce approach is a good one, although I must admit that I didn't become all that familiar with undressed cauliflower until years later. I tried it raw, and it was okay (certainly less like an ocean creature than raw broccoli), and I had it in stir-fries and Indian dishes, but I still just wanted to be blown away by cauliflower. After all, it possesses loads of nutritional content, and is practically a blank canvas in every way. I just wanted it to not taste like a blank canvas, you know?

I've been on a mission lately to succeed with cauliflower, and I've come pretty close, I think. Granted, this dish involves plenty of cheese and some other cauliflower-masking ingredients, but the true flavor of the cauliflower is still really able to shine. Beneath the cheese blanket, you can taste the nuttiness of the cauliflower, and you can still access its sturdy, smooth texture. It's a rich and phenomenal dish, the kind that is easy enough to whip up on a weeknight for dinner, but even the kind you might like to have at a dinner party. It is wonderful because it is satisfying in the way potatoes are, but (gasp!) it's actually a vegetable! Oh, and cheese is a vegetable too, right? Best of all, it's the kind of dish that just might convert anti-cauliflower folks into pro-cauliflower folks. And that, my friends, is quite a feat for a vegetable that has spent a lifetime being pushed around on a plate.

Change-Your-Mind Cauliflower Gratin
adapted from a Barefoot Contessa recipe

1 (3-pound) head cauliflower, cut into large florets
4 tablespoons (1/2 stick) unsalted butter
3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
2 cups hot milk
1/8 teaspoon grated nutmeg
1/8 C chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley
3/4 cup grated smooth-melting cheese, like gouda or gruyere, at room temperature
1/2 cup grated parmesan
1/4 cup fresh bread crumbs
1 t salt
1 t pepper
1/2 t red pepper flakes

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. Cook the cauliflower florets in a large pot of boiling salted water for 3 or 4 minutes, until slightly tender but still firm. Drain.

Melt 2 tablespoons of the butter in a medium saucepan over low heat. Add the flour, stirring constantly with a whisk until it thickens -- for about 2 minutes. Heat the milk and pour it into the butter-flour mixture. (Hot milk is important because cold milk will shock the mixture and cause it to get lumpy.) Whisk until it comes almost to a boil. Cook, whisking constantly, for 1 minute, or until thickened. Off the heat, add 1 teaspoon of salt, the pepper, red pepper flakes, nutmeg, half of the parsley, 1/2 cup of the first cheese (gouda or gruyere), and the parmesan. (The cheese doesn't have to be brought to room temperature first (as suggested), but it helps keep the sauce smooth.)

Pour 1/3 of the sauce on the bottom of an 8" x 11" x 2" (or similarly sized) baking dish. Place the drained cauliflower on top and then spread the rest of the sauce evenly on top. Combine the bread crumbs with the remaining 1/4 cup of gruyere (or gouda) and sprinkle on top. Melt the remaining 2 tablespoons of butter and drizzle over the gratin. Sprinkle with a little salt and pepper. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes, until the top is browned. Top with remaining parsley. Serve hot or warm.

There! It's done! Now your cauliflower opinion has been changed forever.