Fried Cauliflower

Beginning of the week starts with an empty fridge in our household.  I'm never sure why, because we are buying food at least once a week and yet the fridge is almost empty on every Monday.  I had to figure out what to make for lunch as usual and all I had in the fridge was a cauliflower and some carrots.  Normally carrots are the default option that I go for, but instead I decided to take on the cauliflower.  I didn't want to just steam or boil it, then end up making a cauliflower salad like I do most of the time.  I wanted to try another Turkish recipe, the fried version.  I haven't had this dish for a very long time, so I got some tips from my mother and I also looked through my cookbooks.  Tess Mallos has a version of this in The Complete Middle East Cookbook, but I made my mother's version.  In the end, that would always the best version for me.  This is very good as a starter, appetizer or as a vegetarian dish, especially when it's combined with garlic yogurt.  I made some steaks with tomato sauce and saffron noodles for the main dish.   In the end it was a delicious meal.

Fried Cauliflower

About 500 g cauliflower, broken to its pieces and washed

2 tablespoon of flour

4 tablespoon dry breadcrumbs

2 eggs

oil for frying

salt

Garlic Yogurt

Plain yogurt

a clove of garlic

To start with fill up a deep pan with water and bring it to boil.  Add some water in it then put in your cauliflower that's already broken to its pieces. Boil it for about 10 minutes until it's tender but not soft.  Don't overcook it.  If it's too soft, it would be hard to boil them.   When they are done, put them in a colander and drain the water.  Leave them to cool for about 10-15 minutes.

In a plate or bowl, beat your eggs and mix them with the flour.  Add some salt and pepper to the egg-flour mixture.  In another plate put your breadcrumbs.  Put some oil in a frying pan and heat it up.  You can use a non-stick pan to fry but in the end you are going to need a generous amount of oil to properly fry the cauliflowers so don't be stingy with the oil.  When your pan is ready and hot enough,

dip your cauliflowers first into the egg-flour mixture.  Once they are covered with it, dip them into the breadcrumbs, then put them in the pan.  Fry them until they are golden and a little bit crispy.  

For the garlic yogurt, crush the garlic and mix it into the yogurt.  Dip your fried cauliflowers into the garlic yogurt and enjoy the taste.