Truffle Roasted Cauliflower

    

 

 During a month-long hiatus from writing, I was instead researching food, cooking and eating across parts of Spain and Italy. Someone had to do it.  For those of you that may follow me on Instagram, you will have seen at least a few snippets of the really tough work that I was doing (i.e really delicious meals...those that I could remember to memorialize).  Using some of my foreign treasures and the best local ingredients here in the UAE, I have managed to return to Abu Dhabi with some new inspiration.

 

 

  I also recently got a new Elekta oven and so was very excited to put it to use.  It has a rotisserie, convection and both top and bottom heating elements (not always a given on ovens here in the UAE)! 

 

  

 With clear memory (jealousy) of all of the truffles popping up on the menus of Northern Italy this time of year, you think I would have been able to get my fill.  Nope!  I shoved a jar in my luggage just before I left, using the excuse that if I got delayed on the way home, I would have a really nice snack.  And now with those fresh truffles becoming less fresh everyday, I decided to pretend that it was feeling like autumn outside.  I grabbed a huge head of cauliflower from the local market to make it lightly-creamy, and roasted with truffle.  While it is super simple to make, it is a fun, out-of the-ordinary dish. 

 

 

 I delicately grated one soft truffle into 1/2 cup of cream, heating it on the stove with a clove of garlic to meld the flavors.  I then added 1/4 tsp of salt and a few grinds of black pepper.  I poured it all over 1/2 a head of cauliflower, and roasted it just until the cauliflower was soft all the way through. This short roast keeps the cauliflower moist with the creamy sauce.  Obviously, finding truffles is a bit difficult for most of us, so if you find your self out of luck, you can resort to using truffle oil...although I would not really recommend it because it is very hard to judge the grade of the oil. 

 

 

Before eating it,  I did add a little grated parmigiano too.
Being cheesy can't hurt.