Recipe: Roasted Garlic Cauliflower Puree

First of all, let me state for the record that I have never been a fan of cauliflower. It's like weird, mutant, albino broccoli. So, when various people would tell me that they made pureed cauliflower and it was "like mashed potatoes!" and it was "soooo good!", I was, shall we say, skeptical. I guess I finally was told it was good by enough people that I decided to give it a shot, but I was still not expecting much.

As it turns out, I was wrong. This is soooo good and it ends up being quite a lot like mashed potatoes!

Ingredients:

• 1 bulb garlic
• 1-2 tsp olive oil
• 1 head cauliflower
• 1/2 cup chicken broth
• salt and pepper to taste

Directions:

1. Cut the end off the garlic bulb to expose some of the cloves (not the root end...the other one) and remove as much of the outer paper as possible while keeping the cloves together. Drizzle the cut ends with olive oil and wrap in aluminum foil. Bake in a 425 degree oven (I like to use the toaster oven for this) for approximately 1 hour or until garlic cloves are soft. Take out of oven and allow to cool at room temperature (it just needs to be cool enough to handle without burning your fingers).
2. Cut the cauliflower into even-sized florets. Boil, covered, in the 1/2 cup broth for about 10 minutes or until cauliflower is easily pricked with a fork. Careful...not too mushy! Also, 1/2 cup broth won't look like a lot, but don't add more! You puree the cauliflower with the liquid later, so adding more will make the puree come out too thin.
3. Remove cauliflower from heat. Squeeze roasted garlic cloves out of their skins and add it all to the cauliflower.
4. Use an immersion blender to puree the garlic, cauliflower, and broth. Add salt and pepper to taste.

I enjoyed this so much, I'm making it again tonight. I'm serving it with bison burgers....yum!