Cauliflower fritters

Last night I had an epiphany. I actually like cauliflower.
I spent most of my life telling everyone I didn't like it nor eat it , but once again the guys at the organic co-op forced me to reconsider by dropping a big head of cauliflower in my weekly produce bags. At first I thought about giving it away, but let's be honest: how likely is that? I mean, if I were trying to give away freshly picked strawberries it would be easy, but cauliflower?
Then I was sitting at the office the other day and a coworker offered me her homemade cauliflower fritters. They were good. Very good.
So I decided to keep my cauliflower after all and make my version of fritters with it. Even though I call them fritters they aren't fried. I made them on the griddle with cooking spray to make them lighter -we were already having a monster porterhouse steak as a main dish and really didn't need the extra calories. They turned out great. So again, thanks co-op guys. Keep the veggies coming.

CAULIFLOWER FRITTERS
Makes 12 fritters:

1 cauliflower
2 eggs
Salt and pepper
1 cup all purpose flour
1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese
1/2 cup panko (or regular) breadcrumbs
Cooking spray or oil for cooking

Trim and chop the cauliflower. Steam it for about 15 minutes or until tender. Let it cool down. Chop finely.

In a medium bowl mixed chopped cauliflower eggs, cheese and breadcrumbs. Season with salt and pepper. Add flour a little bit at the time and keep mixing until the mixture is dry enough that you can form patties with it.

Heat oil in a pan or turn a griddle on high and spray with cooking spray. Cook patties in batches, about 4 minutes per side or until golden.

Banana nut muffins

If you live in Florida, you know the problem. Everyone -and I mean everyone- you know owns a banana tree and they all make a truckload of bananas at exactly the same time of the year. On top of that, I have the additional problem of the kind folks at the organic co-op filling my produce bags with bananas every week. As much as Tommy likes bananas, there is only so many a human being can consume each day. What to do with rest?

The good news is that bananas freeze well. You can mash them, store them in ziplock begs and shove them in the freezer until it's time to make muffins. Based on my calculations if the co-op guys keep the bananas coming I will never catch up and have a banana-free freezer. But I will always have fresh banana nut muffins laying around the house, which isn't shabby a all I guess.

BANANA NUT MUFFINS:
Makes 18 muffins

2 cups all purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
1/8 tsp ground nutmeg
2 beaten eggs
1 1/2 cup mashed bananas
1 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup melted butter
1/2 cup chopped walnuts or chopped pecans

Grease bottom and sides of two muffin pans, set aside.
Combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg and 1/4 teaspon of salt. Make a well in center of flour mixture, set aside.
In a medium bowl, combine eggs, bananas, sugar and butter. Add egg mixture to flour mixture. Stir just until moistened. Fold in nuts. Spoon batter into pan.
Bake in a 350 over for 20 to 25 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in a muffin comes out clean.

Root vegetable medley

I haven't lost my mind. I normally don't crave root vegetable is the middle of one of Florida's hottest summers -I normally gravitate towards raw tomatoes and the likes- BUT, some of you know that I have recently joined an organic co-op and every week I receive two begs full of fruits and vegetables, some of them of the kind I wouldn't normally buy at the store. Case in point: purple kohlrabi. My grocery store doesn't even carry it, to be honest, and even if it did, I cannot say that kholrabi has the attractive look that would drive me to buy it.
The co-op, of course, gave me not one but three of this strange vegetables. That meant finding not one but three recipes to get rid of the things before they went bed. The first recipe I found was on the back of the co-op's newsletter -a medley of root vegetables by renowned chef Wolfgang Puck. I liked it enough to try it, but of course had to somehow change it and make it "mine". It turned out really good and yes, the purple kohlrabi tastes great!

ROOT VEGETABLE MEDLEY:

8 carrots, peeled and trimmed
10 baby turnips, peeled
6 baby potatoes, skin on, cut lengthwise in halves
2 onions, peeled and cut into quarters
1 purple kohlrabi, peeled and cut into thick wedges
1 celery root, cut crosswise into 1-inch-thick slices
1 whole head garlic, separated into cloves, unpeeled
3 sprigs fresh rosemary
Salt
Freshly ground black pepper
Extra-virgin olive oil

Preheat the oven to 400 F.

Put all your vegetables and the herbs in a large baking dish. Season well with salt and black pepper, drizzle generously with olive oil, and toss them to coat evenly.

Place the baking dish in the preheated oven and cook, stirring the vegetables occasionally, until they are tender and golden brown, about 45 minutes.