Another Snow Day

Roasted Cauliflower

I read this somewhere in my travels--a doctor's office, or a newspaper.  Unfortunately, I can't remember the source.  But last weekend, when Giant had cauliflower on sale, I thought I'd give it a try.  I really like cauliflower, but Mike isn't too crazy about it.  He still isn't.  But this is my favorite cauliflower recipe now.  I'll definitely do it again.

Directions:
Preheat oven to 325 degrees.
Remove all green parts from cauliflower and thoroughly wash.  Shake dry.  I used parchment paper sprayed with a little olive oil (I made my own little sprayer with a nozzle device from the dollar store) on a baking sheet.
Rub the cauliflower heads with a little oil and salt and pepper to taste. Bake for about 1 hour and 20 minutes, depending on your oven.  Cauliflower should be turning a little brown, but not burnt.  Also, cauliflower should be fork tender.

Serving:
You can serve as is.  The flavor is great.  I made mashed cauliflower with one head--just like you would mashed potatoes.  With the other, I made a Red Curry Cauliflower Soup.  It's Thai and it was very tasty.

Roasted Cauliflower

You know it's a snow day if I'm in the kitchen:

Chocolate Banana Pound Cake

Oh my, oh my.  So I'm looking for a different way to use of excess bananas.  We always have bananas on hand, and I usually make smoothies, or banana bread.  I was tasting for chocolate and so was Mike. My cookbooks were all old-fashioned spiced banana cakes with cream cheese frosting and I just wasn't in the mood for that.  A quick search on the Internet for Chocolate Banana Pound Cake came up with this amazing recipe.  It's from Food.com, and the contributor, Annie Michelle, said it was passed to her by her mother with "a "tad" of embellishment."
I tweaked this a little to try for a "little" healthier version.

Here's the recipe:

Ingredients
1 cup butter (room temperature) I used Earth Balance vegan margarine.
2 large eggs
1 cup sugar
1 cup brown sugar
4 bananas (mashed)
1/3 cup buttermilk I used Kefir.
3 tablespoons vanilla extract
1 teaspoon cinnamon
2 1/2 cups flour I used white whole wheat flour.
2 teaspoons baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt I didn't use any.
1/3 cup baking cocoa
1 cup boiling water
1-12 ounce bag semi-sweet chocolate chips (This is optional.)
1 cup chopped pecans (Also optional.)

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Grease and flour two 9x5x3 loaf pans.
3. Cream butter, eggs, sugars, bananas, buttermilk, vanilla, and cinnamon.
4. Mix together flour, baking soda, salt, baking cocoa, and pecans.
5. Add dry ingredients to creamed ingredients.  Mix well.
6. Add boiling water and stir rapidly for 2 minutes. I used my stand mixer on low speed to gently stir for 2 minutes.
7. Pour batter into loaf pans.
8. Bake 45 minutes.
9. Remove from oven (gently) and sprinkle chocolate chips over tops of loaves. Wow, this was a mess.  My pans were so full that the chips kept falling off.  So I actually ended up putting them on at the end after the cake at settled a bit.  It only took a few minutes for the chips to get soft enough to spread.  They actually spread better than the chips that made it to the oven.  Those got a little charred.
10. Return to oven for about 15 minutes, or until toothpick comes clean when inserted into center of loaf. Again, I'd just bake it through and add the chips at the end.
11. Remove from oven when finished and place on cooling rack.
12. Use spatula and spread melted chocolate chips in even layer over the loaves.
13. Let cool and remove from pans. I sliced in place.  It came out nicely.
14. You can warm or serve as is.
15. This recipe could also make 48 small cupcakes.  Bake for 20 minutes and substitute a chocolate frosting.

Nutrition (This is following the original recipe.)

Servings per recipe-24

Calories-214.7

Calories from Fat 76

Total fat 8.4 g, saturated 5.1 g, cholesterol 35.9 mg, sugars 20 g, sodium 209.9 mg, total carbs 32.9 g, dietary fiber 1.3 g, protein 2.5 g

Chocolate Banana Pound Cake

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