Nothing says I love you on Saint Valentine Day like cauliflower! Say what? And not only that we will mix the cauliflower with a very dark chocolate.
WHY you ask ?????????? Ever dabbled in food pairing? The theory goes like this: 80% of the tasting experience comes from the smell and only 20% from the taste. So if the major volatile molecules of two foods are the same, they might taste nice when eaten together. What may seem like an impossible pairings can actually be a perfect compliment. Click here is you want to read more on food pairing.
Well it turns out caramelized cauliflower and cocoa (or a very very dark chocolate) is a great match. I actually did this combo once during a food pairing dinner and it was the hit of the night, everyone in shock. These two recipes are my submission for February’s #chocolatelove month! Why 2 recipes? Because the second recipe below (the original one) has a big mistake in it which required fast thinking on my party to save the recipe. It says 40gr of chocolate….I believe it should have been 140gr. Instead of going in the fridge it went in the freezer to become a semifreddo. I remade the recipe with the proper correction and without the egg, eliminating the cooking in the oven part. Much easier but I offer you both options.
Cauliflower Terrine with Cocoa
Caramelized cauliflower
I just happened to receive recently some wonderful dark chocolate from Green & Black’s Chocolate. It was a perfect match for this unusual recipe I had in mind. I have worked with this organic Fairtrade chocolate before but never with the Dark 85%: very rich and dense in flavor with a hint of sweetness. The recipe actually asked for 99% but I thought the 85% would work very well.
Please join in on the #chocolatelove fun by linking up any chocolate recipe from the month of February 2012. Don’t forget to link back to this post, so that your readers know to come stop by the #chocolatelove event! The twitter hashtag is #chocolatelove 🙂
Ξ Cauliflower Terrine with Cocoa Ξ
correction from the original recipe below
Ingredients:
250 g cauliflower
140 gr dark chocolate 85% cocoa, chopped
200 ml heavy cream
a pinch of cayenne and salt (I used African Bird Pepper)
Directions:
Pick cauliflower into small pieces. Blanch the flowers in boiling, salted water for 1 minute. Then transfer them in ice-water, drain the flowers. Spread them over a baking grid and bake in an oven at 400 °F for approx. 30 min, turning the flowers after 15 min. Line a mini terrine rectangular*** mold with foil and fill with the cauliflower. Set aside.
***Make your own mini terrine rectangular mold 2 x 2 x 11 inches***
Chop the chocolate into small pieces. Heat the cream to boiling point and pour over the dark chocolate. Let the chocolate melt for 5 minutes without stirring. Whisk the mixture until smooth. Add a pinch of salt and cayenne and mix well. Pour the chocolate mixture in the mold covering the cauliflower. Close with a cover. Gently strike mold on the counter to remove air bubbles. Refrigerate for 24 hours. To serve, un-mould, peel off the foil and slice into wedges to serve.
Ξ Cauliflower Terrine with Cocoa Semifreddo Ξ
adapted from La Mia Cucina
Ingredients:
250 g cauliflower
40 g dark chocolate 85% cocoa, chopped
200 ml heavy cream
1 egg
a pinch of cayenne and salt
Directions:
Pick cauliflower into small pieces. Blanch the flowers in boiling, salted water for 1 minute. Then transfer them in ice-water, drain the flowers. Spread them over a baking grid and bake in an oven at 400 °F for approx. 30 min, turning the flowers after 15 min. Line a 450ml triangular mold*** with foil and fill with the cauliflower. Set aside.
***The recipe asks for a 450ml triangular mold…like really who has that? So here is what you can do instead. Get a 9 inch square pan and put it in a lasagna dish. Prop it up to a 45 degree angle with something that is ovenproof. Make a cover with a strip of aluminum paper.***
Over moderate heat in a pan, add the chocolate to the cream and stir until the chocolate has dissolved and the mixture is homogeneous . Let it cool a bit and then whisk in the egg. Add a pinch of salt and cayenne and mix well. Pour the chocolate mixture in the mold covering the cauliflower. Close with a cover. Gently strike mold on the counter to remove air bubbles.
Place the filled mold in a water bath and cook at 195°F in the oven for 1 hour. Let the terrine cool down, then put mold in the freezer overnight. Remove the terrine from the mold, leave out to soften a bit and cut into 1 inch slices slices. Leave out o thaw out a bit before serving. Ideally the cauliflower would no longer be hard.
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P.S. I just had to share this really cute and naughty book with cookies which would make quite the unusual Saint Valentine gift: the Kama Sutra for Cookies book, featuring an unabashed gingerbread couple, who are photographed in unflinching full color, the Cookie Sutra is a recipe for pleasure.
This is a combination I would never have thought of making! Perhaps I should try. This might be the only thing with which I could make my son eat cauliflower lol!
Oh! This is sure a very interesting combination…cauliflower and chocolate…something to try in the future 🙂
Happy Valentine’s Day Evelyne!
Wow, Evelyne, this is what I call “daring”! I never would have thought of this combination. Hats off to you! I’m really curious about the flavor 🙂
Who would have thought you could have veggies & chocolate. Your are a true foodie!
i love the originaity of it !!Pierre
It’s the mark of a great cook that you can make a mistake, call the resulting dish something else, and serve it anyway. 🙂 Once again, you surprise us! I still have trouble wrapping my mind around this one though, especially since the smell of cooked cauliflower is so strong… But then, caramelized onions have a completely different smell than sautéed ones, so I’m guessing the cauliflower smell changes too.
ii never thought about combing cauli and chocolate together!!!! WOW. i am tempted to roast my cauliflower head and just coat them in dark chocolate. sending some #chocolatelove to you!
Evelyne, how can you tease us all with such a tasty chocolate treat? I love chocolate and the fact that you created a recipe with such dark (wholesome) chocolate and such a yummy veggie is just … wow. All I can say is: Leftovers?
Evelyne, you are such a great cook! I would never imagined or tried the combination of cauliflower with chocolate. I’m stunned with your amazing work. My mom loves terrine everything. But I bet she had never have this one. 😉
Really chocolate and cauliflower. Another strange combo from your part. Definitely curious to try it out.
I know I can always find the weirdest and most wonderful combinations here! This actually looks really good, though I thought it was dessert until I read the comments.
Wow!!! This is so incredibly creative. I love cauliflower and love chocolate – but together? I totally believe you though. I will have to try this.
Your creativity always amazes me! I never, ever would have come up with this combo, but now I’m so, so intrigued and would love to try a sample 🙂 What a great post, Evelyne!!!
HUH… really… Huh… OK, have to admit, I am a skeptic, but you wrote a terrific post, made it sound most excellent.
Thanks for sharing, eRecipeCards.com
Dave
I’m kind of scared to try this and yet I’m so tempted to…
I’m gonna be honest, I probably would not have picked out cauliflower as a top choice to add to a chocolaty dessert, but I really have to hand it to you for thinking outside the box. I could see how cauliflower gives the dessert a great texture – I’m all for walnuts with chocolate, so I imagine cauliflower gives a similar bite, in which case, I’d eat these treats non-stop! Thanks for getting creative!
This is what makes you so special, you’re creations are so unique and daring at times, but cauliflower has such a neutral flavor, it completely makes sense. Love it and would love to not only taste it, but feel the texture!
A very unique combination of cauliflower and chocolate, very curious to try!
This is definitely a never-before-seen combination. Green & Black’s has great chocolate. Hopefully you get to try all of their varieties.
I am in utter shock after reading about this recipe. It sounds so crazy! Could you tell me what purpose the egg has in the mixture so that I may be able to veganize this dish? Thanks a ton and I’m glad to see this as part of #chocolatelove! 🙂
Thanks for your comments. I am going to make an educated guess on the eggs: they are to bind and thicken. I would go ahead and skip the egg and oven part, go straight to the freezer. It would be the equivalent of making ice cream without a custard base.
This is very interesting combination. I think you are very brave to try this new taste and concept! Brilliant!
Wow! What a unique combo! I will have to try this!
Wow, I am so curious to taste this. It’s a fascinating concept, I totally want to read more about it.
Very intriguing concept! Great addition to our #chocolatelove fun.
Definitely like this, it is savory. I guess it could be an appetizer??? With 70% It could be a dessert I think. Not milk chocolate though. First time I made it, it was part of the main meal with more cauliflower served on a disk of gelified cocoa.
Wow, this is definitely not a combo I would have thought of on my own! Now I’m curious to try it….
BTW thanks for the links, they are great sites
I’ve heard of various veges in desserts – eggplant/blackbean brownies etc but this one takes the cake, well, takes the terrine:)
I am guessing this is savoury, not dessert. If this is savoury, perhaps it can become dessert if we use sugar or replace dark with milk chocolate? Have you tried variations?:)