And pickled onion. I know that title seems a bit ridiculous, but I really couldn’t leave anything out. These are so so sssooo good, and every component is it’s own little hero in the dish. That’s a thing, right? Food heroes? Anyways – I made these one Sunday in the crock pot when we were having friends over to watch football, planning on eating the leftovers for lunch the next day. Duck tacos? I assumed a few of our pals would opt out just based on the idea of duck tacos. Well…. I was wrong. Really, really wrong.
Oh, hello January weather! There you are! It is apparently supposed to get super-duper cold tonight (the high around here for tomorrow is 36*), and oh man do I have the perfect meal for you. My main squeeze is one heck of a chili cook, and prides himself on this particular “recipe” – he claims there is no real “recipe,” and that he wings it every time, but there is a pretty general base of ingredients and it never fails to be delish. And yes, Wuan is spelled correctly in our world… The history behind it is a bit silly, but, long story short, there are people out there who legitimately think “Juan” starts with a W. {Disclaimer – Mr. “Oh yea, Juan, I knew it started with a W,” if you’re reading this, no hard feelings! Best nickname ever).
I am not sure why it took me so long to make this… For real. My original intent was to cook everything in the big dutch oven, and then transfer to a baking dish, cover with the crust, and bake. Um, no. WARNING – this recipe makes a lot. But, it is fantastically delicious, so that’s probably more of a good thing. The pack of vegetables I used definitely made the amount of filling much larger than I had anticipated, but never you mind. Now that it is getting chilly (after being 80* a few days ago… again), this is the perfect meal to make on a Sunday afternoon. Remember – it’s even better the next day. And the next. Mayyyybe even the next. Hey, that’s what freezers are for, right?
What a happy Friday, indeed, friends! Perusing the calendar earlier this week, I realized that today marks the one-year “birthday” of the bright side of the road! My mind is torn – I can’t decide if I feel like it has been much longer than one year, or just a few short months. But, with 87 posts, nearly 15,000 {just looked again we – are at nearly 17,000!!!} views, and a whole bunch of happy, happy news in between, I guess a year really makes sense! Didn’t we just reach 10,000? Gahh I feel like that was just last week, and that was the end of September! Well, let me just throw in another big THANK YOU to all of you readers! This has really been such a fun experience for me, and I look forward to delivering more stories and more recipes in the upcoming months. {Duck season is oh-so-close…!!!!}
Happy Tuesday! I hope everyone is having a good week so far… I have to say, it is hard sitting in an office after spending a weekend outside in beautiful weather! We headed up to Georgetown Friday evening, although we didn’t make it there in time to get in the stand before it got dark. No bother! There’s always Saturday, I told myself. Besides, who would want to miss this sunset view as you arrive?
With goat cheese… and cauliflower crust! Aha! I knew I would lure some of you in with the temptation of pizza (those of you who would otherwise baulk at the cauliflower crust part in the title). But trust me, it is so so good, you won’t even miss the fluffy, doughy crust from a delivery pie. Not that there is anything wrong with that fluffy, doughy crust. No sir. But, a certain someone at home was pre-ttttyyy skeptical about the cauliflower crust… And guess who ate half the pie? That’s right. It was officially man-approved. Now get to cookin!
INGREDIENTS:
CAULIFLOWER CRUST
1 head of cauliflower, medium size
1 whole egg, whisked
1/4 cup shredded mozzarella
1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese
1/4 tsp each salt & pepper
1/2 tsp dried basil
1/2 tsp dried oregano
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp dried Italian seasoned bread crumbs + more if needed
TOPPINGS
1 cup venison sausage, browned and cooked through
pizza sauce
1 shallot, sliced thin
2 oz crumbled goat cheese
1/2 cup shredded mozzarella
Anything else you just can’t live without on your pizza – go crazy!
STEPS:
1. Preheat your oven to 450* and place a baking sheet inside to get nice and hot. While the oven is heating up, snag your cauliflower and chop the florets off of the stem, adding them to a food processor. It helps if you can get the chunks fairly small, just to help the processor get them down to size. You essentially want the pulsed cauliflower to look like a giant bowl of feta cheese. See what I mean? Or couscous? I don’t know. Like this.
2. In a microwave safe bowl, cook the cauliflower for around 4 minutes or so to cook it. Once it is finished, remove from the microwave and let it cool for 5-10 minutes. Then transfer it to a clean dish towel and ring out as much of the excess liquid as you can. There will be a pretty fair amount, and if you don’t listen to me and let it cool, you will burn your hands with hot cauliflower liquid and then you won’t want to keep cooking. Did this happen to me? ……. No….. I’m just warning you…
3. A good thing to do while the cauliflower is cooking and cooling is to get your venison sausage browned and cooked. I like to put it in a hot skillet and let the bottom sear for a few minutes before moving it around to cook evenly. See those nice brown crispy parts? Those are the best. Once cooked, set aside until it is time to assemble the toppings.
4. Once the cauliflower is {mostly} liquid free, put it back in the bowl and mix in the rest of the dry ingredients, followed by the egg. I found that using my hands was the best way to get everything combined enough. It should form into a ball pretty easily. If it is still pretty damp, add in the bread crumbs to absorb some of the moisture.
5. Place a sheet of parchment paper on your counter or cutting board, and spray with non-stick spray. Then flatten your dough into a disc. It will vary in thickness depending on how much crust your head of cauliflower yielded. Mine was about 1/4″ thick, but tapered at the edges. Snag that hot baking sheet from earlier and slide the parchment paper/crust onto it. Carefully. It is hot, after all. Then bake the crust for 10 minutes or so, depending on your oven, until the top starts to turn a golden brown. See?
6. Assemble the rest of your toppings! Start with the pizza sauce and add a thin layer of shredded mozzarella. Then get the sausage, shallot, and goat cheese on there, topping it all with the rest of the mozzarella. Then bake for another 5-7 minutes, until the cheese is all melty and delicious. Then turn the broiler on high for the last 60 seconds or so, just to give the cheesy topping that nice golden brown top.
7. Slice ‘er up and dig in! This recipe makes one crust, but it really feeds 2-3 people just because of its size. You can believe me that you might want to just eat the whole thing yourself. It’s a vegetable crust. So the whole thing isn’t even bad for you, right? It’s actually healthy…
Adapted from here.
I know that sounds weird… But trust me, it is so surprisingly easy and good, you’ll want to give it a try. Like, tomorrow. Or today, if you are just waking up. This is one of those quick breakfasts you can make and assemble in less than 5 minutes, wrap it in some tin foil to keep it warm, and walk out of the door to your hunting/fishing destination. I made this sort of on a whim with what I happened to have on hand, so it is pretty simple. So simple I was almost embarassedYou can also vary the ingredients to suit your taste buds, so be creative! *{See below for some variation inspiration}