Baked Cauliflower Poppers

Cauliflower – now here’s a vegetable that can go either way if you ask me. Till date, I like my cauliflower with a little crunch. I think cauliflower has a little bit of a bad rep, because some folks just don’t know how to cook it well. I’ve had cauliflower in many forms – steamed, steamed and tossed in butter, filled in some parathas, as pakodas / fritters or curried like an aloo gobhi (a recipe I will share with you soon), and I like most of them. But serve me some overcooked, mushy cauliflower florets and I will struggle to get through a portion of it.

This is another ingenious way of cooking cauliflower, if you ask me. They call it a healthier alternative to fries, and I will agree. Can you imagine a healthier alternative to fries? It was hard for me to, and I always thought this would be a lot of hype and would not deliver. But, I was wrong, and I’m glad I was wrong. Because these little beauties turned out gorgeous. They are so more-ish, its hard to stop eating them. Like you see in the picture below, I served these up with some skewered chicken (recipe to follow in the next post). It was super quick to put together and it was absolutely delicious. It needs very little prep work, so once you pop it in the oven, you can get on with other tasks you may have to complete.

It turns out, that these poppers can be served with some ketchup, but we loved them just the way they were and didn’t even bother with the ketchup.

If you haven’t tried these yet, I really think you should. I know that these baked poppers will make an appearance at my dinner table every now and then 🙂

Baked Cauliflower Poppers

1 head of cauliflower
2-3 tbsp. olive oil
Salt, to taste
Freshly crushed black pepper corns, to taste

Preheat the oven to 190º – 200ºC.

Wash and dry the cauliflower and cut it up into florets. Try and maintain the same size to ensure even cooking.

In a large bowl, toss the cauliflower florets, olive oil, salt and pepper. Make sure the florets are evenly coated with the oil and seasoning.

Line a baking sheet with parchment paper or foil and spread the cauliflower over it evenly.

Bake for about 20-30 minutes, stirring and turning the florets over every now and then, to make sure they don’t burn. I stirred them around every 8 minutes or so. Keep an eye on them and turn them as needed. You don’t want them to burn.

Once they’re nicely roasted, serve them up hot and enjoy.

This would be so much healthier than a bag of potato chips to snack on too.