Tags
basil, casserole, cauliflower, food, ground turkey, healthy, Leigh Ann, mushrooms, onions, parmesan, The Smarts Eat, tomatoes
Chiffonade basil into the “filling”
I apologize for the long pause between posts. It’s been an emotionally and physically involved past week. But fear not, I have had plenty of opportunities to practice my food photography. The recipe that I write about today is not of my own creation – it is actually an adaptation of a recipe I found on Leigh Ann’s TheSmartsEat Blog (to which I have or will soon have a link to in the Blogs category). The recipe is exceptionally easy, a great way to incorporate a rather bland, yet healthy vegetable, and is delicious to boot. While Leigh Ann makes pairs cauliflower and sausage, I paired mine with ground turkey, sauteed onions, and mushrooms instead. Feel free to adapt this recipe to your liking, and experiment with different seasonings/spices. After I made this dish, I scooped out six portions to freeze for future consumption. I like defrosting each portion, heating it up, and adding a couple dashes of different seasonings to make things interesting – maybe some garam masala in one, some cayenne pepper in another, and maybe even some curry powder and nutmeg in a third.
Boiled cauliflower broken into florets
Cauliflower and Turkey Casserole
While the recipe calls for canned, diced tomatoes, I didn’t have any on hand, and conveniently forgot to buy them at the grocery store. I opted for 28 ounces of garlic and herb marinara pasta sauce instead. I imagine the result would have been similar with canned, diced tomatoes – with the exception of the presence of actual chunks of tomatoes.
1 medium head cauliflower, about 2 pounds
1 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 pound ground turkey (breast or lean)
1 medium onion, diced
4 cloves of garlic, minced
10 crimini mushrooms, diced
One 28-ounce can diced tomatoes
10 basil leaves, chiffonade
1/4 cup bread crumbs (make your own by toasting then grinding 1 slice of whole wheat bread)
1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese
Kosher salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
Special Equipment: 9 x 13 baking dish or large, oven-safe skillet
Bring about 3 quarts of water to a boil. Remove any outer leaves from the cauliflower head and cut a deep X into the core. Boil the entire for about 10-13 minutes, until a knife inserted comes out easily. Drain the cauliflower in a colander until cool – proceed to break the cauliflower in to bite sized florets and continue to let the cauliflower air out while preparing the rest of the dish.
Heat 1-2 tablespoons of olive oil in a large skillet on medium-high heat. Add the turkey breast to the pan and cook until nicely browned. Sautee the diced onions, mushrooms, and garlic until the onions are translucent and the mushrooms have begun to release moisture. Add the diced tomatoes and reduce until the liquid in the pan is almost gone. Taste, and season with salt and pepper accordingly
Preheat the oven to 350 F degrees. At this point, turn off the heat under the skillet, and gently fold the cauliflower florets and basil into the tomato mixture until evenly incorporated. If the skillet is oven-safe, sprinkle bread crumbs and Parmesan cheese directly over the casserole. If the skillet is not oven-safe, then transfer the cauliflower-turkey casserole to a baking dish and then top with bread crumbs and Parmesan cheese. Bake at 350 F degrees for 20-25 minutes until the top is golden brown.
Ground turkey and onion filling (haven’t tossed in the cauliflower just yet), and the golden crusted finished dish out of the oven.