Stardew Valley #4: Cheese Cauliflower

Ingredients: Cauliflower, Cheese

Item Description: It smells great!

Cheese Cauliflower? Don't you mean Cauliflower Cheese? Is this a USA vs UK thing? Anyway we got cheese, we got a cauliflower.  Also ingredients for a white roux/cheese sauce, which is like milk, flour and a bit of butter. Extra criteria for this recipe is that it has to "smell great".

First we disassemble the cauliflower. Just chop the florets off and i might save the leaves for later, as they're apparently about the same as cabbage.

Next we're going to roast the cauliflower for a bit on its own, cause its a tough veg and probably needs longer to cook than some cheese. I'm drizzling it with a cheeky bit of truffle flavoured olive oil and a pinch of salt as well. For FLAVA.

Then grate up the cheese. Is this enough? its probably enough.

Now all the recipes tend to say you make a white sauce with cheese, so we're starting by "melting" some butter and a bit of flour. Dodgy butter tbh, doesnt seem like its melting much does it?

We'll just hope some milk will sort things out. Dumped a bunch of milk in. Just eyeballing this really.

Oop that thickened up quickly, so now its time to dump in most of the cheese, but save a couple handfuls to sprinkle on top for a cheesy crust.

Oooh yeah thats looking good. Thats looking thick.

Well we cant let the sauce dry out, so lets take out the cauliflower and hope its cooked enough. its looking a bit al dente but its getting another 15-20 mins to cook in the sauce so maybe its fine.

Next, im not gonna neglect the spices! I fancy a bit of pepper, paprika and nutmeg. These are the usual suspects when i season a creamy or cheesy dish. You can do whatever you want though. Mustard? rosemary? garlic? go to town.

Now thats looking flavoury, don't forget to sprinkle on the rest of the cheese before shoving it back in the oven. Feel like my veg/sauce ratio could be better, wish id gotten a bigger cauliflower I guess.

Oh damn this DOES smell great!

*****

As someone who's familiar with the concept but never cooked this myself before, damn this is really good! Like ok, its pretty similar to macaroni cheese I guess. But daaaamn. Really pleased with this. Pleased and cheased.