It's December. I've been waiting for December for exactly 11 months now. I've spent 11 months thinking about December. Planning. Practicing. Being pretty damn nervous. I'm hosting the December Daring Bakers Challenge. Thousands of bakers around the world are going to be baking with my guidance this month - which is terrifying. I've got term papers to write, but I'll do all of that with the glint of the Daring Bakers forums peaking behind Microsoft Word, so that I can answer as many questions as possible. It will take up a lot of my head space over the next weeks, as if it already hasn't. (It has.)
But in a lovely departure from such organised pursuits, my friend David recently suggested we form our own baking club of two - with a game entitled "Make Me Jealous". It involves attaching photos and recipes of recent dishes to our emails, in an effort to make one another jealous. He started with pork pies. I've spent weeks contemplating the possibility of vegetarian pork pies - I need to figure it out. It must be possible. Obviously, his pork pies made me, blushing vegetarian that I am, very, very jealous.
I countered him with a whole baked romanesco with rye bread. Tucked whole into my Le Creuset, half submerged in a tomato, olive, and caper sauce. Vaguely Jamie Oliver (who does a baked cauliflower similarly), but a bit more flash. This vegetable is lime green. And conical. And stunning.
It helps that it is a whole romanesco. I didn't have to cook for two days - that's how substantial this dish is. It would easily feed two with leftovers. And it's lovely and warm on a cold winter's day. And as it just started snowing here, warm dishes are all I can think of. I don't know what's next in the Make Me Jealous game - I'd better get baking.
*****
Whole Baked Romanesco
1 onion, finely chopped
3 cloves garlic, minced
300 ml. tomato passata
100 ml. water
1 tbsp. capers, chopped
3 tbsp. black olives, pitted and chopped
1 sprig rosemary
4-5 sprigs thyme
1 whole romanesco cauliflower/broccoli (which is it, anyway?), stalk trimmed
olive oil
salt and pepper
1. In a large casserole with a lid, heat your olive oil and fry off your onion and garlic until soft, about five minutes. 2. Stir in your passata, water, capers, and olives, then bring to a simmer. 3. Add your herbs then season to taste. 4. Rest your romanesco in the sauce, season a bit more and drizzle with oil. Cover and leave to 'bake' on the stove for about an hour over medium-low heat. You might like to spoon some sauce over it as it cooks - up to you. Serve be spooning off segments of the romanesco, covered in the sauce.
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