I have been playing around with recipes for cauliflower pancakes after reading a few recipes on recipes.com. The American versions are way too bland and there are several opinions on the cauliflower...cooked or uncooked to make the batter. After a few tries I finally decided what I like. Makes a quick and easy dinner. I chopped raw washed cauliflower and broke it enough to chop it in a mini chopper. I did two choppers full and the finished cauliflower was the size of dry urad dal or a little larger. You can chop some fresh dhania in with it if you like. I then combined these in a bowl and added 1-2 eggs, couple handfuls of grated cheese (I used colby jack) and some masala. The masala I used was veg stuffing masala made by some store in Delhi (it's yellow and has turmeric and salt and fennel/saunf...the rest is a mystery) but I am sure other good choices would be any masala you used in a gobi dish or even some generic veg masala. Then add enough flour (maida, atta, whatever) (about 2-3 heaping tablespoons...don't make it too dry) to bind the batter but keep it moist. It will set up when it cooks due to the cheese and egg. Fry in a little oil like any pancake. It goes well with pickled banana peppers (available in USA markets) or you could use a spicey (but not sweet) pickle and some type of bread (roll, chapati, whatever). The cauliflower cooks but by not boiling it first you don't get too much smell. Hope you enjoy.
My guess: some besan and rice flour mixed and a little water? If you use cheese that should act as a binder. Anyone else have an ideas for pure veg version?
Update: I have been making these again lately and I have tried them with just boxed masalas to flavor them. Pav Bhaji and also Pakora masalas worked well. I used the pakora one last night and fed to a friend of mine from India and she liked it a lot.
Yes, besan and rice flour combination would work well !! You can just leave out the egg, the recipe would still work or add curd/yoghurt/milk instead of egg, or add a ripe banana and make it sweet !!! Actually cauliflower finely chopped along with ginger and onion and coriander and green chillies (all of them finely chopped) would work very well with any dosa or idli or oothapam batter - just add all the above and salt and make super oothapams (another name for pancakes )
Thanks Hastro for the feedback. Lots of good ideas although I am not feeling the banana thing but that is just me. I will just mention that the original recipe is low carb/higher protein so going the dosa/uttapam route will increase the carbs but that is obviously not an issue in the balance of a total meal. The one thing that my friend noted the other night when she saw me fixing them was that they are low fat also as I just fried on a nonstick pan with just the slightest brush of oil.
