Making good riced cauliflower can be tricky, but it doesn't have to be! I've tried frozen and prepackaged riced cauliflower and it either has a weird taste or tends to be mushier than I care for, plus it's expensive.
The trick to good riced cauliflower is not over cooking it in order to obtain a rice like texture that gives a little when you bite into it, but isn't pure mush.
So, how do you do this? Well, there are a few things to keep in mind.
Tips for making the best cauliflower rice
First, the pan you choose
A heavy/thick bottomed stainless, large, shallow pan works best so that moisture is released and you don't end up steaming your cauliflower. If you use a thin pan you will need to reduce heat and stir constantly to prevent burning. Also, the pan needs to be large enough for the batch you are working with. If the pan is too full you will be more likely to steam the cauliflower. A single or double batch works great in a 10-12 inch skillet, I did a triple batch the other day and it was borderline too much for the pan.
Second, your temperature/heat level
You want it just high enough that it doesn't start to stick or burn, if it is too low it will start to steam it (like I said above, not what we want).
Third, use as little liquid as possible
If you control your temp well (this usually takes a little practice, so be patient with yourself) you should be able to get by with just using a few tablespoons of oil and stirring frequently, only use a few tablespoons of liquid if necessary for sticking, but just add a little at a time to loosen it up if it is sticking. Again, don't want to start steaming it
Fourth, don't over cook it!
You can always cook it a little more but once it's gone too far, you can't go back. When you first try to get the hang of cauliflower rice don't do it when you're in a hurry. Stir frequently and taste frequently. It will also continue to cook if you leave it sitting in the pan if you aren't consuming immediately, so keep that in mind. How long it takes to cook it depends on several things: heat level, thickness of pan, quantity vs size of pan, how small your cauliflower is riced. It can vary from 10-20 minutes from what I've noticed.
Fifth, rice it before you cook it
Next thing we need to talk about is ricing the cauliflower. I rice it BEFORE I cook it, I find it's easier to obtain a more uniform texture and it cooks faster.
You can grate it with a box grater, which is horribly time consuming and a hazard to your knuckles. The best option is a food processor. I don't use my grater attachment, I just put it in with my regular blade and let it do it's thing. Don't let it go too long, if the pieces are really small it will be more likely to cook too quickly and be mushy, I like a little texture so it mimics rice more closely. It's super fast.
Feel free to omit the onion, parsley and/or basil if you don't have it on hand or you just forget (like I did when I took the photo for this post, lol).
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