Cauliflower with Five Spices

Submitted by Girl from India

"This recipe has wonderful flavors that go wonderfully with the cauliflower. It combines two Indian state cuisines(Bengali and Rajasthani). We are a nation of 28 states and each state has a distinct cuisine and then there is a fusion of them . We also have the English and Portuguese influence and then the Mughal. So the number of recipes are infinite."

 

• Ready In: 25mins
• Ingredients: 14
• Serves: 4

ingredients

• 4 -5 tablespoons oil (I use much less)
• 1⁄2 teaspoon cumin seed
• 1⁄2 teaspoon fenugreek seeds
• 1⁄2 teaspoon mustard seeds
• 1⁄2 teaspoon anise seed
• 1⁄2 teaspoon nigella seeds
• 1 large cauliflower, washed and cut into florets
• salt
• red chili powder (I use 1 tsp of chilli but we like spicy food)
• 1⁄2 teaspoon turmeric
• 5 -6 cloves garlic, pounded roughly
• 1 teaspoon ground ginger or 1 teaspoon sliced ginger
• 3 tablespoons yoghurt
• 2 tablespoons fresh cilantro leaves, finely chopped

directions

1. Heat the oil in a deep pan.
2. Drop in all seeds at once.
3. Cover till they stop spluttering Add the cauliflower Stir gently to coat with the tempered oil.
4. Cook 5 minutes Add the salt, chilli powder and turmeric.
5. Traditionally this dish uses a lot of turmeric I have toned it down to 1/2 tsp you can do so further.
6. Cover and cook till the vegetable is half done.
7. Add the garlic and cover and cook till 3/4ths done.
8. Add the ginger and stir.
9. Then add the curd and cook till fully tender.
10. (I like it a little crunchy but traditionally the vegetable is tenderised totally) Garnish with the cilantro before serving.

Reviews

[graffeetee]

this was so tasty! i had no scorching problems, as the cauliflower threw off enough moisture when covered. i did add a larger amount of turmeric and a bit more yogurt. we served it with some spicy green beans over brown basmati rice. just the thing to perk you up after a long week of work!

 

[JacquelineS]

Delicious flavors that were even better as lunch the next day! I, too, added a bit of liquid to keep the cauliflower from scorching.

 

[Charishma_Ramchandani]

This is a nice cauliflower dish. What I liked best about this is the flavour of the various seeds. Unfortunately, I did not have nigella seeds on hand, so I had to do without that. However, like Roosie, I too was worried that the cauliflower would burn without any liquid to cook in. I am having a real hard time these days with recipes, because my mom is on a strict diet and I'm allowed to use only a few veggies for her{no tomatoes and as you know, in our Indian cooking, we use so much of this veggie, so you can imagine what it's like cooking without it}. Anyways, my mom wanted to have cauliflower today but with some gravy{not dry} and since spinach is good for her I decided to make this cauliflower in spinach puree gravy. I'd made recipe #108787 for dinner last night and we had about 1 1/4 cups of the yummy gravy remaining, so I used it to make as gravy for this cauliflower. {Please note: I had to make a few changes in her recipe as well in accordance with mom's strict diet given by the doctor, so please look at the changes I made incase you'd like to try this my way}. After following steps 1 and 2 in this recipe{using just 1 tsp. of oil}, I tossed in the ginger and garlic and stir-fried it with a few drops of water to prevent it from burning. After that, I added the spinach gravy to the pot and mixed it well with the stir-fried ginger and garlic. Then, I let it come to a boil. After that, I lowered the heat and added the masala powders{I used 1 tsp. of turmeric powder, 1/2 tsp. of red chilli powder and 1 tsp. of chat masala powder} alongwith 6 small tulsi leaves{these help to bring down her blood pressure} and mixed them well. I also stirred in 1/8 cup of methi seeds soaked in 1/2 cup of water{this I had kept overnight}. The methi water is said to help bring down a person's weight as well as blood pressure. I let this cook for 5 minutes, covered. Then, I added in the cauliflower florets and allowed them to cook, covered, until half done. After this, I added in 500 gms. of beaten plain low-fat yoghurt and mixed it really well into the florets and the green masala{This gave it a good consistency to cook}. I cooked this, covered, for almost 25 minutes on high heat{i.e. until the florets were tender with the gravy very minimum now and she liked them on doing a taste check}. I served this with hot rotis to her and had some myself with Sunshine Rice{recipe # 112164}. The combo of colours of the two dishes and some green salad...ah, that was beautiful. The tastes went off nicely as well. Thanks for the recipe and I hope you'll enjoy it the way I did it too!

 

[Roosie]

Oooh... nice change from just serving aloo gobi. I really liked all the strong (!) flavors of the seeds, and I thought the flavors combined very well. I added more like 3/4 tsp turmeric since I love it (and you did say the original recipe called for more). I didn't have the cilantro, but I can see how that would be a nice compliment to this. The only thing is, I had to add some stock to help the cauliflower cook- I think it and the seeds would have just burned had I just cooked it without any liquid. Anyway, it turned out nicely in the end. BF thinks it would be best with a little bit of tomato, so next time we will maybe try that. Thanks Fay!