Roast Cauliflower Salad with Green Beans and Cherry Tomatoes
By: Karen Vivers
Published: Wednesday, July 23, 2014 - 7:27am

Ingredients




For the cauliflower
1 x medium cauliflower with the outer leaves removed and broken into roughly equal sized florets (about 750gr / 1.6 lb. of florets.)
3 x garlic cloves chopped finely
Juice of half a lemon
1 x tbsp olive oil
¼ tsp salt
For the Salad
500gr / 1.1 lb green beans which have been boiled for about 7 minutes
400gr / 14 oz. cherry tomatoes, halved or quartered.
A handful of flat leaved parsley chopped finely
3 x spring onions (scallions) chopped finely
The Dressing
2 x tbsp of extra virgin olive oil
Juice of half a lemon
Salt and pepper to taste
To Finish
40gr / 1.5 oz. toasted flaked almonds

Preparation

1 Pre-heat your oven to 220°C / 420°F 2 Place the cauliflower florets in a roasting tin.  Drizzle over the oil and the lemon juice.  Sprinkle over the salt and garlic, mix through and roast in the oven for about 15 to 20 minutes or until the cauliflower has softened slightly and taken on some colour. 3 Whilst the cauliflower is cooking place the salad ingredients in a bowl.  Add your beans whilst they are hot.  The heat helps bring out and blend the rest of the flavours. 4 Add the cauliflower to your dish (also hot if you like). 5 Add the dressing ingredients to your salad and mix through until everything is covered, check for seasoning, sprinkle with the almonds and serve.

About

I always feel a little bit sorry for the old cauliflower.  We can be guilty of taking it for granted and maybe even think of it as being boring.  Smothering it in cheese sauces which seem to cover up it's flavour rather than bringing it out.  Maybe we are even trying to disguise it all together under a blanket of sauce?  Well, I'm not ashamed of using cauliflower, in fact I like to let it shine - even in summer.  My secret is roasting.  By roasting your cauli's something magical happens and somehow it takes on a deep nutty flavour as well as texture.  This salad is the perfect example.