After feeling somewhat defeated with my smokey experience making Sauce Creme for my cauliflower the other night, I decided to make a different sauce and try again! I'm calling this Chou-Fleur a la Sauce Mornay but I did cheat a little with my choice of ingredients. Essentially, this is just cauliflower that has been blanched and then mixed with a cheese sauce. The giant cooking step this was for me -- meaning it was a big step, not that I was cooking giants -- was that I actually cooked something using French cooking techniques Julia has been teaching me but I adapted the recipes to our personal tastes and the ingredients I had on hand.
My sous chef, Elizabeth, had actually prepared a main dish in the crock pot that was going to be ready when she got home so I decided to prepare a vegetable side dish to go with it. I had a fresh head of cauliflower handy so decided to make this. First step -- boiling water with a bit of salt added. I've pretty much mastered the boiling water recipe and don't even need to refer to a cookbook anymore to do that part! The cauliflower was broken down into individual florets and then placed in the boiling water for just 7 1/2 minutes.
Side note: Did you know that the center stem of the cauliflower is actually really tasty? Julia suggests hanging onto the stem(s) and using them to make a soup. Of course, she doesn't provide a handy "cauliflower stem soup" recipe so I usually end up snacking on them with one of my sous chefs. On this particular occasion I discovered that a bit of peanut butter on the stem is pretty good too! It wasn't a very French snack but I was hungry! Back to the recipe...
Julia suggests 9-12 minutes and then running cold water over the blanched cauliflower to stop the cooking process. Being really efficient (lazy?) I've learned that I can boil the cauliflower for just 7 1/2 minutes and not run the cold water over it and I end up with the same tenderness but the cauliflower is still hot and ready to heat without "refreshing" it. My modified technique seems to be working fine when I'm just doing a simple blanching and adding a sauce right away.
Remember, when blanching vegetables it is important to use as large a pot of water as possible even with a small amount of vegetables. Having a large volume of water boiling reduces the effect the cold vegetables have on the water when added. This will result in the water returning to a full boil much quicker and helps the blanching process.
While the cauliflower was blanching I made the sauce. Starting with the basic bechamel white sauce I used 2 tablespoons of butter and 3 tablespoons of butter. The butter was first melted and then the flour stirred in and continued to be stirred while they "frothed together" for about 2 minutes to complete the roux. This is where Julia has taught me the key to making the sauce quickly -- boiling the milk before it is added. The roux was removed from the heat and the 2 cups of milk that had been heated to a boil were poured directly into the roux and beat to thoroughly combine the ingredients.
To finish the sauce, it was returned to a medium high heat and stirred as it came to a boil. After boiling for one minute the sauce had thickened and the "Sauce Bechamel" was complete. This is the point where I quickly looked around to make sure no one was watching and I put a towel over "Mastering the Art of French Cooking" so that Julia wouldn't see me committing a travesty. I did not freshly grate some sort of fancy Swiss cheese, or any sort of fancy cheese for that matter. Keeping in mind that I was making a simple vegetable side dish for Elizabeth's dinner, I snuck to the fridge and grabbed the bag of "Shredded Mexican Style Blended Cheese." Truly an international blend it included fancy cheeses such as Monterey Jack, Medium Cheddar, Queso Quesadilla, and Asadero Cheese. If it works for taco and nachos you know it'll work on cauliflower! Perhaps I'll try Cheez Whiz next time...
Julia warns to only use 1/4-1/2 cup of cheese when making a Mornay Sauce. That's because if you put in to much cheese the sauce can be stringy. Apparently the French do not like pizza because of the way the cheese gets nice and stringy? Since I'd already violated Julias rule of only using a good Swiss cheese, I decided to take a risk and used 3/4 cup of the blended cheese. Luckily I got away with it. Julia didn't say anything and the sauce didn't get stringy. The cheese was simply mixed in with the bechamel sauce and voila! I had a Mornay Sauce.
Well, not speaking French I don't know if this would technically be called a Mornay Sauce but I'm doing so any way. In any case it was a wonderful cheese sauce and the cauliflower with cheese sauce was ready on time, was simple to make, and judging from the very small amount of leftovers it really was delicious. There's still a long long list of things I can't make yet but I think I've got the Bechamel and Mornay sauce preparation figured out. If
you haven't made one of these yet you should try -- you can do it!
Bon Appetit!
Cauliflower. One of my favorites.