Erez’s Cauliflower (Roasted cauliflower with tahini and date syrup)
I watched the Israeli chef Erez Komorovsky make this dish in front of top chefs from all over the world at a seminar on Mediterranean food at the Culinary Institute of America in Napa Valley. When the deeply-roasted cauliflower emerged from the oven, Erez drizzled it, Jackson Pollack-like, with the pale tahini and the dark syrup. The chefs were mesmerized. The dish is sweet, salty and earthy, and I’ve been making it ever since.
Ingredients
- 2 large whole cauliflowers
- ¼ cup olive oil
- ¼ cup tahini
- 1/8 cup date syrup
- salt and pepper
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Wash the cauliflower and dry it. Trim any dark spots off the stem, but leave the leaves intact. Stand the cauliflower on its base and with a long sharp knife cut whole slices, about ¼ inch thick. If your slices look like cross-sections of the human brain, you’ve done good. If they crumble a bit, that’s fine too.
- Coat a large sheet pan with some olive oil, sprinkle with salt and pepper. Arrange the slices in a single layer on the sheet pan– you might need two.
- Roast for about thirty minutes. The cauliflower should be a deep golden brown. Some bits will be crisp. A couple may burn– that’s a good sign. You want this cauliflower deeply roasted.
- Remove from the oven and place in a single layer on your serving platter. The pieces can overlap, or you can leave them on the pan (Erez did). Drizzle the tahini all over the cauliflower. Next, do the same with the date syrup.
- Serve warm
