Malibu is Burning…

 
image by dan4th.

This week, I got two heads of cauliflower in my CSA box. Two heads! The last time I got cauliflower a couple of months ago, I’d quickly grown tired of eating it raw or in vegetable soup. Krista, my vegetarian new neighbor, suggested I make cauliflower mash. 

I searched online for recipes of this so-called mash, but couldn’t find anything that didn’t have butter, sugar, ranch dressing, heavy cream or milk. Not that I’m vegan, but the whole point of the CSA box is that I try to make super-healthy meals with it, Iron Chef-style. I don’t care how many heads of cauliflower are in it, if there’s a stick of butter, sugar and ranch dressing, it’s not healthy anymore. So I made my own recipe.

I steamed the two heads of chopped cauliflower in my bamboo steamer until it was tender. I threw two or three big cloves of garlic in there too, for good measure. I then tossed the cauliflower and garlic in my Vita-Mix with about 3/4 cup of the hot water I used to steam the cauliflower. I added a shake of Suzy Q for good measure, as well as a smattering of ground black pepper, a couple shakes of ground nutmeg and a light tap of cumin (my ground cumin doesn’t have the plastic top with the holes in it for some reason). I pureed the whole thing up, and when I tapped out the mash into a casserole dish, it actually smelled awesome.

The texture was like a very light mashed potato, and there was just a hint of cauliflower on the nose. I stuck the casserole dish in the oven at 350 for ten minutes, until the top had lightly browned. I wish I’d had the foresight to take pictures, but frankly, the cauliflower mash didn’t last long enough to get up to grab the camera. It was, in a word, awesome. So much so that I can’t wait to make it for my family when I go home to visit this weekend!

It takes a lot of fuel to power an Olympian. How about all of the Olympians in Beijing’s Olympic Village? Between coaches, competitors and staff, over 800,000 eggs will be consumed, among many other things.

Blogger Jon Henley of The Guardian made a valiant effort to eat like Michael Phelps, but failed miserably.

Apparently when you move your server, you have to update your original feed address on Feedburner. Whoops! Anyway, the feed’s back online now, which also means my Twitter updates will begin to update again.

Most people just yell, “I quit!” or yell at a customer or something. But Timothy Tackett went for the gold–or silver, as it may be–by taking a bath in a BK stainless steel sink, filming it and putting it up on YouTube. Enjoy your fourteen remaining minutes, TT.

Could your chili make a grown man cry? Then take part in the chili cook-off at this year’s Arroyo Grande Harvest Festival. The festival will be held on September 26 and 27. No word on when the cook-off is, but the chili will be judged in four different categories, and the top three contestants in each category will receive trophies. Call the recreation division for more information at 805-473-5474.

image by thebittenword.com.