Roasty Goodness - Cauliflower

Yes, that's right, cauliflower.  It's low carb, has a good amount of fiber, and has a ton of vitamin C, as well as Vitamin K, folate, B6, and potassium.  It's true, look it up!

Most cruciferous (your $.10 word for the day) veggies are more tasty when they are cooked, but not over cooked.  And really, boiling = waterlogged.  Steamed? Ok, but a bit boring, no?

Enter, roasting!  Set your oven on HIGH (like, 450 degrees) and get out your oil spray (if you are watching calories, which I do on occaision) or drizzler, some salt and pepper, and get ready for a real taste treat.

Here's what to do:

Trim a head (or 2) of cauliflower. Cut off the leaves, trim the stem (but you can keep it), and scrape off any brown bits from around the florets

Line a flat (or low rimmed) baking sheet with aluminum foil or parchment paper (which might get a bit toasty, but will still be ok).

You can drizzle some oil on the sheet at this point if you want to.

Now, you can either cut the cauliflower head into about 1inch sized slices - yes, it will crumble a bit, but that's ok.  Or, you can break it into florets, which works fine as well.

Here it is, sliced:

1 head of cauliflower, sliced and laid out

 Drizzle the cauliflower with olive oil, and if you have it, flavored olive oil-- I used garlic oil, in my spritzer, so I'm just using a very small bit, but it really helps with the browning and flavor. 

Sprinkle liberally with salt (I like herbamare seasoned sea salt) and fresh ground pepper. 
Put in your hot hot oven for about 30 minutes or so, keep an eye on it.  You do want it quite brown, that's where the flavor is.
Flip the pieces about 1/2 way through, but if you forget, that's ok.

Here's the finished product, before we gobbled it all up!

1 head of cauliflower after roasting

It's great hot from the oven, but I like it cold too, as part of a salad... oooh! idea for lunch tomorrow!