Wednesday 23 November 2011

Broccoli and Cauliflower Bake

I think I may have chosen an odd week to start a daily food blog.  Normally, I do the "big" food shop over the weekend and then shop for "bits" the rest of the week.  This is pretty standard.  This week however, the bits have taken a knock on the head in favour of emptying the fridge before we go to a family wedding in the Midlands.  I hate wasting food so I'll be spending the next couple of days making cake and soup.  These will last longer than the bananas and carrots that are already threatening to walk out of the fridge.

Next to the carrots in the crisper sits a full head of broccoli and half a cauliflower that also need some attention.  My mind starts to wander but I can't shift the idea of a huge mound of delicious Cauliflower Cheese.  Mixing both brassicas won't be a problem, I'll just cook the broccoli for less time than the cauli before adding the sauce and baking.

My dilemma comes in the form of the cheese sauce. Importantly, which cheese to use.  For a Cauliflower Cheese I always use the sharpest Cheddar I can lay my hands on.  Broccoli however, goes so well with blue cheese that it's almost a moral duty to combine them.  Recently, for one reason or another, I have been having lots of conversations about blue cheese and so subliminally my mind is made up.  Stilton it is, and plenty of it, there is little worse than an uncheesy cheese sauce.


I love cooking.  Selecting the ingredients, chopping and peeling veg (including onions).  Judging the quantities and tasting to get the seasoning just right.  All culminating with the satisfaction of giving someone you love a well deserved good meal regardless of the occasion.  The gratification of a satisfied look, conversations stopping and a cleared plate, drive me to cook.  I am honest enough however, to admit when a little help is needed or to bow to a better chef.  Cheese sauce is one of the things in the kitchen that I will readily admit that Z can make so much better than me, that it's not worth me bothering.  Thank you for my gorgeous meal.

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