Cauliflower couscous – halfway through the Whole30
When we did the whole30 for the first time somewhere in August last year I had never thought cauliflower would be such a versatile vegetable. I mean, sure, we all know cauliflower right? It’s good. And in it’s plain form the best way to have it is with potatoes and a good meatball… or so I think. But at some point while reading through some of the documentation on paleo I saw a mention of cauliflower rice. Rice. From cauliflower? Really? It didn’t immediately sound very appealing to me, but it did sound interesting and let’s face it; if you’ve made a lovely curry you want to eat it with rice or something “rice-like” so I tried the cauliflower approach and loved it.
And then I realized that I haven’t really shared a recipe with cauliflower here so here it is. I hardly ever make the same dish with this and I just throw in what I have on hand. I would also rather call it cauliflower couscous as really the consistency is more couscous than rice but maybe that’s just me. And like couscous, the cauliflower is like a blank canvas you can work with. It tastes completely different from normal cauliflower. We’ve had people over for dinner who didn’t guess that they were eating cauliflower instead of couscous.. It’s just that good. The qty’s given here are for a lunch dish for two. If you eat this as a sidedish this will be enough for four.
Cauliflower couscous
Ingredients
- 1/2 head of cauliflower
- 1 red bell pepper
- 1 or 2 spring onions
- seeds of one pomegranate
- 150 gr smoked chicken fillet
- handful of flatleaf parsley
- coconut oil
- salt
- pepper
- zaatar
- sumac
- 1 garlic clove
- Break the cauliflower into rosettes and put them into a kitchen processor. You can do this by hand but it requires a lot of work and cutting and cutting and you will never get it as fine I would think. Pulse the cauliflower in the machine until it resembles fine crumbs the size of couscous. Turn out into a bowl and set aside.
- Cut the bellpepper and the chicken and chop the garlic finely.
- Heat the coconut oil in a large frying pan until hot and add the bell pepper, garlic and the chicken in. Bake until the bell pepper becomes a bit translucent.
- Add the cauliflower and bake for a few minutes. It doesn't really need long. Usually about 5 minutes is enough to cook the cauliflower.
- Add the chopped parsley and the spring onions in. Season with the salt, pepper and the zaatar and sumar. I added roughly one tsp of each of the last two spices in the mix. Because the cauliflower is quite bland you might need a little more salt and spices than you would normally. Taste!
- Once everything is cooked serve with a sprinkling of the pomegranate seeds on top
Disclaimer
The nutritional values above are calculated per portion. The details are based on standard nutritional tables and do not constitute a professional nutritional advice.
4 comments on “Cauliflower couscous – halfway through the Whole30”
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Such a pretty dish and when food looks that good you’re really not missing out on a thing!
Janie x
Thanks so much Janie! It does look and taste really good!
A diet is only successful when it’s real food and not a deprivation and this certainly fits. It’s so pretty to look at too!
That is so true Maureen! And this food is certainly delicious enough.. 😉