Ingredients
- 1 Large Cauliflower
- 4 Tbsp Cornflour + 1tsp
- 4 Tbsp Plain Flour
- 1 Large Knob of Ginger
- 2 Cloves of Garlic
- 3 Tbsp Sweet Chilli
- 3 Tbsp Sriracha
- 150ml light Soy Sauce
- 2 Tbsp Rice Wine Vinegar
- 50ml Water
- Handful of Sesame Seeds
- Salt
- Pepper
- Vegetable Oil
- If you are going to have rice with this, you might want to start cooking it at the start. When cooke, it will stay warm and be ready so the cauliflower keeps its crunch
- In a bowl, mix together your cornflour, plain flour with a sprinkling of salt and pepper. Add a splash of water, adding bit by bit to the flour mix, stirring continuously until you have a smooth batter. You are looking for a consistency between single and double cream.
- For the sauce, add a tablespoon of vegetable oil to a pan. Grate your garlic and ginger and add to the pan. Cook these for 30 seconds, then add your sweet chilli, sriracha, vinegar and soy sauce. Cook this until everything has melted and mixed together.
- In to a small glass, add 1 tsp of cornflour and mix with 2 tbsps of water. Pour this into the sauce and stir as it thickens. Keep the sauce on a very low heat stirring occasionally to stop it catching
- Heat a deep pan with enough vegetable oil, ready for deep frying. Keep an eye on its temperature
- Slice your cauliflower into small-medium-sized florets. put the florets in batches into the batter and toss to coat.
- Once your oil is hot (test it with a piece of bread which should brown in about 10s), add your coated cauliflower piece by piece gently to the oil and fry them for 5-6 minutes until slightly browned. Remove and set aside. Don't put too many in at a time or the oil will cool and the cauliflower won't be as crispy. Repeat until you have cooked all the cauliflower
- Put your cauliflower ina serving dish and pour over the sauce, mixing to coat the florets.
- Serve the cauliflower on a bed of steaming rice. Scatter a handful of sesame seeds over the top and get stuck in!
Method
Another day in lockdown, another meal to plan for four carnivores and a veggie. There is of course a list of regular go to's but that feels like a cop out most of the time and as we get into summer and fresh produce comes into the market, it feels more and more like a largely veggie based diet is not the compromise it can seem like in the darker months. Are you really saving the planet eating Asparagus flown from Peru?
Enough already. Isaw this recipe on the Mob Kitchen Insta feed (get me) and thought it looked v tasty. It has all the ingredients of a south korean sticky chicken wings kind of thing, but without the chicken, and with cauliflower instead. So I decided to give it a go.For bulk I also made some of Mr Peng's excellent french chips (see elsewhere on this blog). Both prove the maxim that deep frying improves everything, and all of us were content.
This dish is a keeper, all voted to have it again. With the ingredients as is the sauce is quite spicy that could be cos I was using a spicy sweet chilli sauce, or just because of the quantity of sriracha. Either way, you may want to dial it down a little, or not depending on your preference. I will make this again, and it shows conclusively that even cauliflower can be turned into something delicious, a long standing quest for me. Seriously, this is sticky, crunchy, spicy and hot in a good way.
Incidentally, I have re-ordered the Mob recipe because it is vague to the point of being annoying - one of their traits seems to be not quite enabling you to make the dish as well as possible which seems to defeat the purpose of their site. They need to get people to try their recipes as they are often missing information which nervouse cooks will find daunting or unhelpful. Just my point of view.