The FastDay Forum

I had a cauliflower in the fridge and decided that I needed to something other than roasting or mashing it tonight for my fast day meal. So, I googled - found a few cauliflower pizza recipes and adapted them. The crust comes in at 350-400 calories (depending on cauli size) so you've got a little to play with on toppings (aside from not having enough for masses of cheese!)

For the crust:
1 small-med cauliflower head
1 egg
2 tsp spelt flour (to help bind it)
pinch salt
pinch oregano
some crushed garlic
20-30g grated parmesan.

Turn the oven on at a high heat (225-250C) and, ideally, throw a pizza stone in there.

Put the cauliflower in a food processor until it's 'rice' or you can grate it.
Then put the 'rice' in a teatowel and squeeze as much moisture out of the cauliflower puree as you can. You'll be surprised what comes out!

Add the rest of the ingredients and mix it up. You should end up with a pretty wet "dough".

Take a piece of baking parchment (or an oiled tray) and press out the dough into one (or more) pizza shapes. Put it into the oven for 20-25 minutes, you can try turning it once but the dough is fragile so you may not want to.

While the base is cooking, make up your toppings. I put a tiny bit of oil along with some garlic and an anchovy into a pan, and then 3 tomatoes (roughly chopped) and let them simmer down along with a tsp of capers.

Once the base has turned golden brown, take it out of the oven, add the tomato topping and anything else you want - I put on some mushrooms, a few sliced olives and a scattering of parmesan (which was probably unnecessary with some in the base) and put it back into the oven for 5 minutes.

I know that we can mostly have real pizza on a feed day but, it was a nice change to have one that didn't feel quite so heavy on the belly afterwards!

Love cauliflower, and this has no wheat so I think I will do this on a feed day with mozerella cheese, thanks applespider

I tried this a while back, and while the mixture was delicious, it didn't really work as a pizza. It was soggy in the middle but the edges were as cooked as they could be without burning. Maybe I didn't squeeze out the cooked cauliflower enough?

I added a couple more eggs to the mixture and cooked it in a muffin tin, and it made lovely little eggy/muffin snacks.

[carorees]

And does the base taste cauliflowery? (is that a word?)

Ha! Ha! I love it- cauliflowery has a lovely ring to it. It should be a word imo!

Love cauliflower, and this has no wheat so I think I will do this on a feed day with mozerella cheese, thanks applespider

The original recipe I looked at was on the Guardian site - 10 recipes for cauliflower and they used 100g of goats cheese rather than the egg/flour mix to hold it together. I've also seen it with mozzarella mixed through the base rather than egg.

I tried this a while back, and while the mixture was delicious, it didn't really work as a pizza. It was soggy in the middle but the edges were as cooked as they could be without burning. Maybe I didn't squeeze out the cooked cauliflower enough?

I didn't cook my cauliflower first. I just blended it and then put it through the wringer in a tea towel. I was surprised by how much water was released though; it was a lot more than I expected. I squeezed out as much as I could, left it hanging in a sieve over the bowl for 5 minutes and then did it again. I used a hotter oven than the recipes suggested too and for longer. It was still more flimsy than my regular pizza base but held together; I ate it with knife and fork rather than fingers!

And I only put the toppings on it and back into the oven long enough to melt the cheese etc... which might have stopped it going soggy in the middle

IAnd does the base taste cauliflowery? (is that a word?)

It is now

Um... yes, I definitely could still tell it was cauliflower but it wasn't overpoweringly so. Perhaps because it didn't have the same texture as cauli usually does. If I'd been served it in a restaurant, I'd have figured it out eventually but had to think about it. I suspect that if you needed to disguise it (to get kids to eat etc) then adding some more cheese or strong flavours to the 'dough' (chilli/mustard/basil - not together!) would pretty much hide it.