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Cauliflower (Remove all the large green)
Remove all the large green leaves and the greater part of the stalk, and soak, head down, in a pan of cold water which contains to each quart of water a tablespoon of vinegar. Put in a large saucepan, stem end down; cover with boiling water; add a tablespoon of salt and cook from twenty to thirty minutes, according to the size of the head and its compactness. Remove as soon as done, for overcooking darkens it.
A plain boiling method from the era when cauliflower was cooked whole and served under a sauce. The technique is sound; the timing is the part to reconsider.
- Cut the timeTwenty to thirty minutes will reduce a modern head to grey mush. A whole head of average size is usually tender well before that, in the region of 15 minutes; florets take 5-7. Test the thickest part of the stem with a knife tip rather than watching the clock.
- The vinegar soakThe acidulated cold water soak (1 tablespoon vinegar per quart) is there to drive out insects lodged in the curd, not to season. The recipe sets no soaking time; a spell of half an hour head-down does the job. With today's cauliflower it is optional, though still worth doing with untrimmed heads from a farm stand.
- Stem end downStanding the head on its stalk puts the dense core at the bottom of the pan and spares the flower heads from knocking about and crumbling.
- Salt quantityA tablespoon of salt is for a large saucepan of water, several quarts. It is a seasoning rate, not a brine.
- Keeping it whiteDarkening comes from overcooking and from long contact with iron or aluminium. Use a stainless or enamelled pan, and lift the head out the moment it yields. A splash of milk or lemon in the cooking water is the traditional insurance against yellowing.
- Cover or notCauliflower and its cabbage relatives release sulphur compounds that concentrate under a lid. Cook uncovered, or with the lid ajar, for a milder smell and flavour.
- Yield and servingA medium head serves four. In a book of this period it would go to the table whole with drawn butter, a cream sauce, or buttered crumbs; drain it thoroughly first or the sauce will slide off.
Whole-boiled cauliflower under a white sauce was a fixture of American and British vegetable cookery from the mid-nineteenth century well into the twentieth, and the long timings in books like this one reflect a period taste for vegetables cooked soft rather than any deficiency in the cauliflower itself. The vinegar soak is a survival from kitchen-garden days, when a head came in from the row with whatever was living in it; commercially grown, washed produce has largely made the step unnecessary. Mrs. Fryer's loose-leaf format suits an entry like this: a bare procedure with no ingredient list, written for a cook who already knew what to serve over it. Such bindings are often said to have allowed pages to be taken out and handled at the worktable, though they were also sold so that an owner could insert recipes of her own.