Taking a bite of this reminds me of Ratatouille, when Anton Ego eats his plate of the aforementioned dish and melts into that closed-eye, ear-to-ear grin. When eating this cauliflower rice, I have fictional flashbacks of leaping around as a child in the french countryside . . . despite growing up in the urban jungle of Manhattan.
That said, I must confess that calling this post a recipe is a bit of a misnomer, because the focus is more technique than anything else.
I have found that the key to cauliflower rice is getting as much water removed from the cauliflower as possible. My favorite way to do that is to cook the rice on a low setting for a couple of hours to dehydrate it. That way, the cauliflower rice browns oh-so-nicely when sautéed in a pan.
My Favorite Cauliflower Rice Recipe
Servings: 1 serving as a meal; 2 as side dishes
Time: 3.5 hours
Ingredients (method):
- 1 bag of frozen cauliflower florets (12 oz)
- Cooking Spray
- Pinch of Salt
Directions (method):
Preheat your oven to 170 degrees;
Set up your food processor with its "s" blade. Empty the bag of cauliflower into the processor. You can immediately start to pulse if desired, but I like to wait 20 minutes to let the cauliflower soften a little bit -- it makes it much easier and less noisy;
Use short pulses to turn the florets into rice;
Cover a large 12 x 17 sheet pan with parchment paper; spray lightly with cooking spray.
Spread the cauliflower rice into an even layer onto the sheet pan, and lightly dust with salt;
Place the pan into the oven until the cauliflower is sufficiently dehydrated -- it will seem to decrease in volume a lot, but don't worry -- that's normal!
My preferred length is 2.5 hours in the oven. After that time, I turn off the oven but don't take out the pan for another half hour. However, my sister prefers it slightly less done, with a two hour duration, so feel free to play around with it!
You can eat the cauliflower rice straight from the oven, but I prefer to then sauté it in a pan for extra flavor. To do this, add a tablespoon of butter or oil in a pan over medium-high heat. Sauté the cauliflower rice in the pan until nicely browned, around 3-5 minutes.
You can also save the cauliflower rice after the dehydration process and sauté it later, which is my normal method. It lasts in the fridge at least 5 days.
For my favorite spice mix, see below 👇
Ingredients (recipe):
1 tbsp butter
3 tbsp chopped white onion
1.5 tsp za'atar spice mix
2 tbsp golden raisins
1.5 tbsp chopped flat leaf parsley
1.5 tbsp slivered almonds
salt & pepper
olive oil, for drizzling
Directions (recipe):
Melt the butter in a pan over medium high heat;
While the butter has partially melted, toss in the onions, stir until they soften for about 3 minutes;
Add in the cauliflower rice, sauté for another 3-5 minutes until edges are nicely brown;
In the final minute, add the za'atar spice and chopped parsley, stir to combine. Also add salt and pepper. Be aware that some za'atar spice includes salt already;
Take off heat, mix in golden raisins and almonds;
Drizzle a just a touch of olive oil over the top, and enjoy!
Method pictures:
Recipe pictures:
