An Easy Recipe: Roasted Cauliflower With Almond Butter

Since I’m currently receiving chemotherapy relating to last year’s stage 1 breast cancer diagnosis, I’m exploring and creating (or modifying) a variety of recipes for tasty, healthy food that I can prepare in a short amount of time. Several friends have asked for the recipes, and since “tasty, healthy food with short prep time” isn’t just for cancer patients, I’m sharing them periodically on the blog.

Today’s Recipe: Oven-Roasted Cauliflower With Almond Butter.

Ingredients:

1/2 to 1 head of cauliflower (depending how many people you plan to serve). 1/2 a head can generally serve one hungry person as a main dish or 2-4 people as a side.

3-4 tablespoons of almond butter* per 1/2 head of cauliflower used

salt and pepper to taste

* I use almond butter because it’s the best option for my current dietary needs. If you prefer, you could also use peanut, cashew, or sunflower butter.

Recipe:

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

While the oven heats, wash the cauliflower and slice it into 1/2″ slices. (Note: you can prepare this with flowerets too, but the cauliflower cooks more evenly, and holds the almond butter better, if you slice it.)

Lay the cauliflower slices on a parchment paper-covered baking sheet (no sticking, and easy cleanup) and sprinkle them with salt and pepper:

Bake at 375 for 15-20 minutes, or until the cauliflower begins to soften. Remove the pan from the oven, turn the cauliflower slices over, and salt and pepper the other side before returning them to the oven.

Bake for another 15-20 minutes, until the cauliflower has softened and begins to brown:

Remove the tray from the oven and spread a thin layer of almond butter over each slice of cauliflower:

Return the tray to the oven and bake 5-10 minutes, until the almond butter has softened and begun to melt down into the cauliflower.

Remove from the oven and serve while warm!

(Admittedly, this isn’t my greatest plating job, but I was too eager to eat it to think about plating…my bad!)

Cauliflower is highly nutritious, low in calories (which is good, because almond butter is NOT) and delicious, especially with almond butter. This recipe is a good introduction to cauliflower, if you haven’t tried it or if you want to get non-vegetable lovers to give it a try. As an added benefit, almond butter is a nutritious, non-dairy option for people avoiding butter and cheese (which I’m trying to do, at least for the duration of chemotherapy).

What do you think? Are you tempted to give it a try?