Getting Fancy

San Francisco Chronicle restaurant critic and food writer Michael Bauer has done us a bunch of favors over the years - for example, he told us about Rosso in Santa Rosa. For that alone, we owe this guy our undying gratitude. He has steered us toward wonderful meals in the past and away from possibly disappointing ones as well.

So, when he got the recipe for this cauliflower custard topped with strips and wedges of colorful veggies from a chef at Poggio, it seemed like a really fun thing to try, despite the somewhat fraught techniques.

Like making veggie strips - never done that before (turns out it's not too difficult). And the custard - what it boils down to is making a white sauce and simmering the cauliflower in that before adding eggs, puréeing and baking, but the technique in the recipe is more complicated than that.

Still, the newspaper picture was compelling and we do love cauliflower, so what the hey?

I chopped and shaved, stirred and puréed, poured and baked, plated and piled, served and sampled, hoping for a really spectacular first course dish for a special dinner. I was imagining a fragile custard that barely held together and tasted of cauliflower, like crême caramel only savory, topped with a tangy, colorful little salad of fresh veggies. Folks, I gotta tell you, the little salad atop the custard was the best part. The texture of the custard was more like a cake and the nuttiness of the cauliflower was nearly lost.

I'm going to try this again because the idea still seems marvelous to me and, knowing my kitchen techniques, it could just be that I made a large boo-boo along the way.

I'm going to tweak the recipe when I try again. I want a more custardy custard and I think small niblets of cauliflower left whole in the custard would actually be a textural improvement. I'm going to spark up that colorful salad with a bit of lemon juice, too, and... well, I guess I'll wait until I've succeeded to talk about all that.

So, my thanks go out to Mr. Bauer for the idea and, of course, for Rosso. I'll keep reading as long as he keeps writing, even if our taste in custards differs somewhat.

Tickled With Pickles

I met my friend Carla when I agreed to be the block captain for our Neighborhood Watch program; Carla was the instigator of this group. We have a surprising amount of mostly petty crime here in our otherwise idyllic little town nestled against the bay, so Carla helped us to organize and try to defeat the Bad Guys. It has paid off - just this week one of our alert neighbors called the cops on four suspicious characters and nabbed them red-handed with a laptop they had stolen from a guy down the street. Those women are back in jail now - they were on parole, so their asses are grass this time.

Anyway, that has nothing to do with pickles except that Carla brought us a jar of hers to thank us for some scanning we did for the Neighborhood Watch program. Now, you may have noticed that if I write about pickled things, it's a rarity, because I honestly don't know what to do with them. I'm sort of a novice about pickles. Oh, I have made pickled beets from time to time and enjoyed them but that's the extent of my pickling knowledge.

So, hey, pickle fans! I'm tickled to receive pickles but I need help! How would you suggest I use this beautiful jar of pickled cauliflower?

Cauliflower Challenge

Do you have trouble getting your family to eat cauliflower? I don't, and here's why.

Cheese-frosted cauliflower.

I learned this method of preparing cauliflower back in the Dark Ages and have loved it ever since. Basically, all you do is mix mustard and mayo in proportions to your taste, smear the top of a steamed cauliflower with said mixture, top with cheese and run it under the broiler to melt.

As usual, I had one ingredient for a favorite dish but none of the rest, so I had to improvise. Some of my best meals begin this way, with hands thrown up in the air as I discover that some key ingredient is missing.

This time, I had the nice, big head of pure white cauliflower. I broke off some florets to nibble while fixing the dish and gave some to Cora, who is very partial to cauliflower, and the rest I cored and popped into a big pot with about an inch of water in the bottom to steam just until tender but not so soft that it falls apart as you lift it out of the pot.

While the cauliflower was steaming, I mixed up a dab of mayo with about three tablespoons of Dijon mustard but, interestingly, this was not my usual Grey Poupon but a new-to-me brand called Edmond Fallot, which My Beloved's daughters brought me from their last trip to La Belle France. It looks more yellow, like ballpark mustard, but the flavor is more like traditional Dijon, only somehow mellower. This I smeared all over the head of cauliflower, letting it drip thickly down the sides and into the skillet.

Next, I went into the fridge for my usual cheddar cheese - and realized I forgot to buy some last time I was at the store. (Hand throwing here, with heavy sighs). However, I did have some raclette cheese left from the last time we had that meal, so I sliced that up and positioned the slices all over the cauliflower before popping it under the broiler with the rack set very low in the oven.

That last part is the only reason I didn't burn the bejaysus out of our dinner - I got distracted trying to get my computer to print out a recipe and you know the rest of that story. Luckily, My Beloved remembered and pulled it out just prior to the disaster point. Usually, I just melt the cheese - this time, I crisped it. And it was delicious! The crispy coating hid a softer layer of mustardy sauce that had melted down between the florets to flavor the whole head. The stinkier cheese was a delicious change of pace from the cheddar, as well.

I guess the moral of the story is "don't be afraid to innovate" and "don't get distracted when broiling." Cauliflower can be a challenge but it's easy if you're paying attention.

Late Bloomer

I've always been a late bloomer. I didn't get interested in boys until well into my teens. I didn't learn to drive until the summer before college. I didn't finish college until I was in my late thirties and I was forty before I earned my Master's degree.

Perhaps this will explain why yesterday I was roasting a nice head of cauliflower to nestle alongside our summer grilled pork chops.

I think of roasted cauliflower as the quintessential winter veg but spring had passed and summer was upon us before I got around to using this one. Luckily, cauliflower keeps remarkably well in the crisper. I used Molly's tried-and-true recipe; simplicity itself, it always delivers cauliflower that I just can't stop eating, even chasing the smallest bits around the plate with my fork.

Late bloomers are great, once they get around to (cauli)flowering.

Marital Discord

My Beloved and I are compatible - normally, we agree on 'most everything, from politics to clothing styles to what color to paint the bathroom (orange). We start and end each day wrapped in each others' arms and we hate lengthy separations. We have a lovely harmonious life together.

Except for this soup. When he first tasted it, he gave me The Look, the one that says, "Wow, you've done it right this time!" and dug down into his bowl with a concentrated enjoyment.

Maybe it's because I was tasting it all afternoon as I made it or maybe it's because my head of cauliflower wasn't spanking fresh, but to me it was "meh," okay but not spectacular. It's a pretty simple soup, just cauliflower and onions cooked together in butter before adding veggie stock, simmering and pureeing. Adjust seasonings, yadda, yadda. The recipe called for cream at the end but I had an extra carton of creme fraiche in the fridge so I substituted that instead.

I think it was the creme fraiche that did it for him. It smoothed and gentled the brassica edge while adding richness to what might otherwise have been a lean and healthy soup. I guess a little individuality is good in a marriage - makes for interesting discussions at table.

Piece de Resistance

What can I say? Filet of beef is always a wonderful choice but at FarrahOlivia it is offered with such intriguing sides and sauces that it reaches a whole other level of heaven. The big brown tadpole on the plate was raisin emulsion, sweet but also savory, possibly with onion; the square dish held black corn truffles, a fungus that grows on corn - my brother and I agreed that it was fancypants succotash; the little dab of dark powder next to the filet was a mixture of espresso and chili powders, like a rub but not burned by cooking.

The piece de resistance for me was the cauliflower flan, so delicate in texture and flavor that it deserved its very own plate, possibly its very own pedestal on which to place the plate. It was like an offering to an exacting god.

Crunchy Cauliflower

Cauliflower is one of my favorite vegetables but it hasn't been high on My Beloved's list. Oh, he'll eat it and even admits it's pretty good but I don't usually get the kind of rave reviews that I crave from him when I serve cauliflower.

I'm always on the lookout for a new way to prepare cauliflower, hoping against hope that one day I will find the magic ingredient that will turn cauliflower into a Beloved-thriller. This time, I recalled that I had read about roasting cauliflower on Orangette. I had even tried it once, but in florets that were less successful, so I consulted Molly's recipe again and this time got it right! It's dead simple and yet really tasty.

All you do is toss 1/4" thick slices of cauliflower in some olive oil and salt to completely coat with oil, then bake on a flat pan at 400 degrees F for about 20 minutes, turning the cauliflower pieces once in the middle of the baking time. It comes out caramelized, almost crispy in places and deeply colored, yet soft in the center. My Beloved remarked upon its goodness, a cauliflower home run - or at least third base.