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Pepper (Soak cauliflower head down one)
Soak cauliflower, head down, one hour in cold water to cover; cook in boiling salted water twenty minutes. Reserve one-half flowerets, and rub remaining cauliflower through sieve. Cook onion, celery, and bay leaf in butter five minutes. Remove bay leaf, then add flour, and stir into hot stock; add cauliflower and milk. Season with salt and pepper; then strain, add flowerets, and reheat.
A cauliflower soup in the classic pattern: half the vegetable is puréed into a stock-and-milk base, the rest reserved as garnish. The method is complete but the quantities are not, so treat the amounts below as working proportions.
- Working quantitiesThe original gives no amounts. For one medium cauliflower (about 2 lb), a workable set would be 1 small onion and 1 rib celery diced, 3 tablespoons butter, 3 tablespoons flour, 3 cups stock and 1 cup milk, which should yield something like four servings.
- The hour-long soakSoaking head down in cold water was generally explained as a way to drive out insects hiding in the curd, a real concern with market cauliflower a century ago. (Note that the recipe salts only the cooking water, not the soak.) With supermarket heads it is optional; ten minutes is plenty if you want the reassurance.
- Do not overcook the floweretsTwenty minutes suits the half being sieved, but the reserved flowerets will collapse and turn sulphurous. Lift them out at eight to ten minutes, when a knife just enters, and hold them aside.
- Rub through a sieveThis is what gives the soup its body; the flour is the only other thickener, and the recipe does not say how much. A food mill or blender does the same work faster; if you use a blender, stop short of gluey.
- Flour into hot stockCook the flour with the butter and vegetables a full minute or two before the liquid goes in, or the soup tastes pasty. Add the hot stock gradually and whisk smooth before the milk follows.
- Milk last, and gentlyOnce the milk is in, keep the pot below a simmer. A hard boil risks curdling the milk and coarsening the flavour.
- The final strainingThe instruction to strain after seasoning is for smoothness, not safety, and it catches the celery strings. Skip it if you prefer a rustic texture, but do it if you want the soup to look like the original intends.
- ServingReheat only to serving temperature after the flowerets go back in. A grating of nutmeg or a spoonful of cream at the table is a common addition, though the recipe calls for neither.