#vegetarianmaincourse

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Roasted Beetroot, Goats Cheese & Walnut. An easy, vegetarian main course salad. Elevate your salad game with this irresistible combination of roasted beetroot, creamy goat's cheese, and nutty walnuts. Discover the power of vegetarian dining and create a dazzling main course that inspires your palate.

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Grilled vegetable ricotta lasagne

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Cauliflower Steaks 

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Cauliflower Steaks Two Ways

It’s starting to get cold and we’re after warmer comforting foods. This is a great alternative vegetarian main course, cauliflower steaks. I don’t know about you but I love cauliflower. Not Boiled or steamed, but roasted or pan fried where it gets all caramalised and sweet around the edges.. Mmmm mmm.

 I find if you’re using water to cook cauliflower it takes on too much and becomes water logged and not very tasty. But cooked with a little oil in the oven or on the stove top and it’s a totally different thing. Delicious simply with a little lemon, salt and cumin, a mix of spices of your choices, or added to the traditional cauliflower cheese. It works so well with either flavour choice, taking on spices really well and obviously going so well with cheese. Yum.

 Here I’ve given you two ways of serving a cauliflower steak. One with a more Middle Eastern twist, and probably a little more healthy. And the second with your classic cheesy béchamel sauce but with a little kick from the Mexican chilli guajillo you can use any ground chili though, chipotle also works really well. Or you can leave it out all together.

I’ve used coconut oil in the recipe because of its smoking point. An explanation? Okay. After a history of bad press for being a saturated fat it’s image is changing, some are going so far as to call it a super food. One thing is for certain it’s a good fat to cook with because it has a higher smoking point than other oils.

 Extra virgin olive oil for example, although it is a healthy fat straight from the bottle, it oxidises at high temperatures, thus creating free radicals, which are not so good for you. White and solid at room temperature, coconut oil is slower to oxidise and less damaged and chemically altered by heat than other cooking oils.

  Cauliflower Steak:

Cauliflower Head

1tbsp Coconut oil

Salt and pepper

Squeeze of Lemon

  Preheat oven to 180°C. Trim the leaves and end of the stalk you’re your cauliflower. Starting at top centre of cauliflower head, cut two 1-inch-thick slices of cauliflower, cutting through stem end. Keep the cauliflower steaks and set aside the rest of the cauliflower to use later.

  Heat 2 tablespoons coconut oil in heavy large ovenproof frying pan over medium-high heat. Brush cauliflower steaks with the extra oil and season with salt and pepper, then add the steaks to frying pan and cook until golden brown, about 2 minutes each side. Transfer pan to the oven and bake the cauliflower for about 10 minutes until tender.

  While the cauliflower is cooking choose your sauce and prepare as follows.

  Tahini Sauce with Pomegranate, Toasted Pistachio and Mint and Red Onion Salsa or Guajillo Cheese Sauce

  Cauliflower Steak:

  Guajillo Cheese Sauce:

  1 tbsp unsalted butter 1 tbsp corn flour 1 cup whole milk 1 clove garlic

½ tsp Dijon mustard

½ cup grated Comté cheese

½ to 1 tsp ground guajillo* to taste Freshly ground black pepper

Pinch of salt

  First make the roux, melt butter in a saucepan, stir in the flour and cook the mixture for just under a minute.

Stir in your milk, a little at a time, stirring constantly to make sure no lumps form, add the mustard. Bring the mixture to the boil, stirring constantly, so that the mixture thickens and becomes glossy. Stir in the cheese until melted and the sauce is thick, add your chilli and season to taste.

  Tahini Sauce :

  100g tahini

Juice 1 lemon

About 100ml water

  1 small clove garlic chopped finely

  1 tbsp olive oil

  Salt to taste

  Whisk ingredients together into a thick paste. If you want to make green tahini blend in a small bunch of parsley or coriander. Season to taste.

  Scatter with pomegranate seeds. Slice Red onion, mix with finely chopped mint, a little lemon and olive oil. Season. Sprinkle with sumac and za’atar.

    *Toast a dried guajillo pepper in a dry pan for a couple of minutes on each side until it starts to darken. Grind to a powder in a spice grinder.