Roasted Cauliflower Florets

While a whole roasted cauliflower is an amazing food to make - sometimes you need a lot less and you don't want to wait an hour to make it.

These are readily available for those who don't want to chop a cauliflower or if you need less. One of these bags is just perfect for one.

Getting the bag of microwave cauliflower florets is easy. But instead of taking four minutes to zap them in the microwave, I like the flavor of the vegetable after it is roasted in the oven.  It takes a bit longer, but the depth of flavors is amazing, and it makes a great dish for one.

Start by pre-heating your oven to 400 degrees.

The first step - you can do this as soon as you walk in the door even if you don't know what you are going to make. Often I set the oven if I am going shopping for dinner so that when I come home I can quickly prep the food and get it in the oven. Even if I have to cut the temperature to 350 degrees, by the time I open the oven and pop in the food it is going to be perfect. 

Pretty easy to open the bag and spread the florets out on a pan.  You don't need a cookie sheet for these, something smaller will do.

Then the recipe becomes simple. Add kosher salt, pepper, and olive oil.

Place in the oven for 30 minutes- you can leave them - or in the middle of the oven cycle you can stir them around a bit to get other sides toasted.

I have a small pan that I can put these florets into

I buy large quantities of olive oil and keep them in these squirt bottles. Makes it easy to add the olive oil onto the cauliflower.

Even if you have a salt-restricted diet adding some Kosher salt to these won't hurt you.

Fresh ground pepper - it just has more flavor than pre-ground pepper.

Into the pre-heated oven. You can see in my oven I have a lot of pizza bricks. Those serve to retain heat so when the oven door opens and close they maintain a radiant heat. 

Look at these beauties! Delicious- a bit of that brown cauliflower is delicious. These provide a perfect bit of food for one person and I use them often as a base for other dishes.  

I had some Chicken Korma in the freezer that had been made Sous Vide.  So I re-heated it by putting it into the Sous Vide while I was cooking the cauliflower. This added to the top of the cauliflower made a perfect meal for one.