During my childhood … my favorite vintage period of
the 1950s and the 1960s … one of my favorite vegetables was cauliflower. We didn’t have it a lot. I always figured it was either expensive,
hard to find, or both. It was not a garden
vegetable for us, so it came from the grocery store.
Mama cooked it whole.
She used a big pot that she used for lots of things. She used that pot for so many years that at
the end of her life, it didn’t even have a handle! She still used it. She cooked it slowly in water, but she also
added milk to the water. I was sitting
at the kitchen table one time when I was about six years old. I asked her why she added the milk, and she
told me it helped keep the cauliflower white!
She would flip to see the bright lime green, purple and orange
cauliflowers we get these days! Mother
also made the same cheese sauce every time!
Velveeta was the main ingredient!
I cook cauliflower the same way, and Velveeta is my processed cheese of
choice, too!
Cauliflower is a word that is thought to have come
from the Italian word “caolifliori”, which means cabbage flowers. Europe enjoyed cauliflower during the Middle
ages. For some reason it disappeared but
was reintroduced in the by Italians on the island of Cyprus. It had been taken to Cyprus from Asia. Those cauliflowers were different than the
Middle Ages style. They were named Cyprus
Cabbage.
By 1600, the Germans had “blumenkohl”. The English called it “cole”. Italians loved their “cavolfiore”, and the
Spanish cooked “cliforlor”! There are
mentions of the vegetable in various historic texts and we know that King Louis
XIV liked his cooked in stock and seasoned with nutmeg and butter!
American cookbooks from the 1700s provide recipes for
stewing, boiling and frying cauliflower. Pickling the vegetable was introduced
and was served when other vegetables were not available. In the 1800s, we started serving it with
butter and white sauce. Those recipes
suggest boiling it in milk to “gentle its flavor”. In the 1800s, we also started making creamy
cauliflower soup! And … you thought that
was invented in the 1970s!
It isn’t often that I find something I have never seen
or cooked! That was true not long ago
when I got this magnificent vegetable in my vegetable delivery box! This Romanesco cauliflower was so much fun to
prepare. It was also delicious.
This magnificent vegetable is Italian in origin and
history tells us it was being grown in Rome during the 16th Century. Its flavor is a little bit nuttier than the
regular cauliflower, so I decided it didn’t need any kind of sauce, just a
little butter. I also thought it was a
bit regal, so I served it with chicken breasts stuffed with feta cheese and
wrapped in prosciutto. The color of the
Romanesco faded during cooking, but it was still a pretty site!
The recipe for cooking this big beauty is simple. I used the IP and cooked it for 3 minutes …
just 3 minutes. By the time it built up
pressure and released the pressure, it was perfect. I served it with melted butter poured over
it. Browned butter would have been
delicious, too. I also spritzed a little
lemon juice over it right before I served it.
The chicken recipe is also pretty simple!
Chicken Breasts with Lemon Feta
4 ounce package of lemon flavored goat cheese
4 thick chicken breasts
8 ounces of sliced prosciutto
Salt and pepper
Lemon slices for garnish
When
I want to stuff a chicken breast with cheese, I never want it to melt out of
the meat. Instead of slicing the meat
horizontally, I slice a big space from the top and tuck the cheese inside. That way, it just melts into the little pocket
I cut!
Slice
the pocket into each breast. Slice the
goat cheese log into 4 chunks and tuck a chunk into each breast. Wrap each breast with the prosciutto. If you cannot get or don’t want to afford prosciutto,
deli ham will work just as well. Place
the breasts on a baking sheet and roast at 350 degrees for 30 – 40 minutes. Make sure the juices run clear from the chicken. The amount of time depends upon the thickness
of the meat.
I
served this chicken and my beautiful Romanesco on a bed of white and wild
rice. I drizzled the melted butter all
over the platter!
What
to do with leftover cauliflower? You
will often read about fritters in my blog posts. As I’ve researched a variety of food topics
over the years, I have often encountered the reasons why home cooks prepared
fritters. In the absence of meat during
war times, minced meats or vegetables made into fritters took the place of that
piece of meat. In the absence of money,
the same applied. Using leftovers or small portions of something and adding an egg
and breadcrumbs or cracker crumbs … turned small portions into a meal for
several. The only thing similar to a
fritter that my mother ever made was a salmon croquette. My husband didn’t like salmon croquettes,
because his mother made them with canned mackerel instead of salmon. That was all about cost!
Abraham
Lincoln liked “Corn Oysters”, which were fritters made with fresh corn. Martha Washington made apple fritters that
had dark ale in them. Menus from the banquet
tables of Henry VIII include fritters! I
love fritters.
Cauliflower Fritters
2 eggs
1/2 c cheddar cheese, grated
1 cup crushed crackers
1 teaspoon of lemon pepper
Sprinkle of salt
olive oil for frying
Mash the cooked cauliflower and press it in a sieve to push all the water out of it. If you freeze leftover cauliflower, it will have even more moisture in it, so push! Stir cheese, eggs, cracker crumbs and pepper together with the cauliflower.
Put a little olive oil in a skillet and set it to medium-high heat. Form the cauliflower mixture into patties about 3 inches across. Cook until golden brown & set, about 3 minutes per side. Sprinkle with a little salt.
These are fantastic served with a salad or a bowl of soup. They are a great side dish for most any meat. Enjoy!
I'll be sharing this column with a few blog parties, so look at the list on my sidebar and go visit. This post is a part of my 2020 Vintage Vegetable project. If you'd like to see similar columns, just click my menu tab for the project.
