Cauliflower Hot Wings!

 Alright alright already, I'm posting the Cauliflower Hot Wings recipe. Jeez you guys. 

Skip to TL;DR version at the END of this post. I'm sorry, I'm not technically savvy enough to know how to do a link that will take you somewhere else in this document. 

OK so I humbly admit, I printed someone else's recipe for these yummy morsels and I cannot find the original link to save my life, so whoever created the original version - you're amazing, I wish I could name you personally. At any rate, its not really plagiarism anyway because I modified the recipe so much that its barely recognizable. That's just how I roll. 

The original recipe was actually for BBQ flavour. I am not a huge fan of BBQ sauce, but I took one look at the photo and said "I can work with this". And there are hundreds, literally hundreds, of versions of BBQ and Hot Wing versions of this baked cauliflower recipe too, mine is just one more on the pile. I did find the timing on this worked out absolutely perfectly to make them nice and crispy, so it is a great starting point to jump off from to get to my version. 

The real joke of the original recipe though is that it was written using only half the ingredients I just listed, and claimed to serve 3-4 people. I'm like... you have got to be kidding. I doubled it and it turned out so good that I ate the entire thing. 

SO, step one - chop up your head of cauliflower into florets. Not huge, not small, just nice and mediumish. Put florets into a large bowl that you can use to toss. Turn on the oven to 425f, and line a large baking tray with parchment. 

Drizzle some oil, your favourite, over all of the florets in the bowl, and toss to coat. Use enough so that they all get a little coated. Original recipe did not specify a quantity, just use your judgement. 

Sprinkle some flour, doesn't really matter what kind (original recipe says you can also use almond meal), over all the florets, tossing intermittently to ensure all get sprinkled. The original recipe called for a half cup of flour for one large head of cauliflower, I find this was a little more than I felt it needed so I quit sprinkling after about 1/4 cup. Use your judgement. More flour might make it crispier. 

After flour coating, sprinkle and toss again with onion powder. Recipe called for 1/2 a teaspoon for one large head, but I feel this is way too little. I'm a flavour fiend, bring on the seasoning. I also decided instead to grind up some crispy fried onions (my #1 all time favourite seasoning) and replace the 1/2 tsp onion powder with more like 1.5 tbsp of ground crispy onion meal. I did not regret this at all, I think it totally made the recipe. 

So now, after the dry coatings, here is where it gets weird. Next thing this recipe calls for is 6 tbsp of milk. MILK! I don't even know what to say about this. I decided to replace the milk with watered down plain yogurt. Again, did not regret. Drizzle the yogurt (or milk, if you wanna) over top of all the florets, tossing intermittently again. The milk is, I imagine, just a wet coat before you do the breadcrumbs, next. 

The original recipe here calls for an optional CUP of breadcrumbs. Well as it happens I am doing a low-carb diet right now, so I said NO to breadcrumbs. I did, however, add a good shake of nutritional yeast, and that was a good idea. My second favourite seasoning after the crispy onions. 

You are now done the first stage of preparation. 

Roll all of that out onto the parchment lined tray, and spread your florets evenly so they are not crowded on the tray. If you have any broken bits, don't throw those out, just mound them up into a pile, they will bake together into a unit. Slide that cat right into your 425 oven, and bake for 25 minutes. 

At this point you want to make your sauces. Original recipe, as I said earlier, called for BBQ sauce, about a cup for a whole head. Not in the mood for that today, so for this recipe, I have to admit, I used up the remains of a jar of hot sauce that I bought at a local restaurant here in town, the Atlas Cafe, they make their own and it is great. However I think this would be just as good using Franks Red Hot, or whatever version of hot sauce you would normally like on your chicken wings. 

I mixed the hot sauce about half and half with plain yogurt, a bit of melted bacon fat (my third favourite seasoning) and added a minced garlic clove. Apparently the fat helps bond the sauce to the cauliflower, so dont skip that, but you can totally use olive or coconut or whatever. So that worked out to I guess about 1/2 cup each of sauce and yogurt, and maybe a tablespoon of bacon fat. I put mine into a squeeze bottle so I could get a nice even coating on the cauliflower, rather than dumping it all in a bowl and having big blobs on some and not enough on others. I still have some left in the bottle for next time! 

At this time I also made a dipping sauce out of, yes, more yogurt. Plain yogurt, about half a cup, mixed with a minced garlic clove, pinch of salt, and about a tablespoon, maybe a bit less, of apple cider vinegar. Amount of vinegar depends on how tangy you want it, but also on how hot your cauliflower sauce is - vinegar helps take away the burn of spicy food! 

So now, when your timer goes off after the first 25 minute cycle in the oven, take out the tray, and put all the cauliflower pieces BACK into your mixing bowl from before (or a new one if you're OCD and already washed that), and squeeze or ladle your hot sauce so that it gives all the florets a nice light coating, tossing intermittently. Put them all back onto the same tray, flip them so the already crispy side is facing up, and put these cats back in the oven again for another 15 minutes. 

The original writer of the recipe made a note that whoever he/she is, he/she likes to broil them for an additional 5 minutes at the end. I did not do this however, and I found they were plenty crispy. 

Now, for all you TL;DR complainers that don't enjoy my prosaic journey of experimentation and just want me to get on with it already, here is the best |I can do for an actual recipe. Although I will say, you're missing out on some good intel doing it this way. Keep in mind, this blog is for a TEST KITCHEN, not a published recipe book. And, as I said several times above though, you need to use your own judgement for several of these steps. 

INGREDIENTS

 - One large head of cauliflower, broken into medium florets

 - Oil or oil spray, enough to coat lightly

 - Approximately 1/2 cup of flour (any type) or if you don't like flour, try almond meal

 - EITHER 1/2 tsp (more) of onion powder, OR if you have access to crispy fried onions, grind some of these up and keep them in your spice cabinet, but for this recipe use about 1-2 tbsp (your taste) 

 - 5-6 tbsp of EITHER milk of choice, or watered down plain yogurt

 - OPTIONAL 1 cup of breadcrumbs (I replaced this with a solid shake of nutritional yeast instead to keep the calorie count down) 

 - 1 cup sauce to coat - either BBQ or hot sauce, or like I did, a mixture of half and half hot sauce and plain yogurt. I recommend adding a bit of garlic to the hot sauce, or ginger to the bbq if you go that route. See, I can't stop narrating!

 - 1-2 tbsp oil or melted butter or bacon fat

 - OPTIONAL Sprinkle with sesame seeds and/or scallions

 - Dipping sauce: 1/2 cup plain yogurt, 1 minced garlic clove, pinch of salt, about 1 tbsp vinegar of choice. You could maybe use lime in this too, and some cilantro, that would be lovely. I'm doing that next time I make this. 

INSTRUCTIONS. 

1. Preheat oven to 425f. 2. Line large baking tray with parchment. 3. Cut cauliflower into florets, and toss in large bowl with oil to coat lightly. 4. Toss florets with flour and onion powder. 5. Toss again with milk or yogurt. 6. Turn contents of bowl out onto baking tray, and spread evenly, do not crowd. 7. Bake first stage 25 minutes. 8. After first stage bake, remove from oven, move florets from tray back to mixing bowl, and squeeze or ladle your coating sauce over your florets. Toss until coated, and place back on tray with crispy side up. 9. Bake again for 15 more minutes. 10. Remove from oven, eat with dipping sauce. 11. Weep with joy at the wonder of your creation. 

Electoral High

I went to clean up my drafts folder, and found this post I'd started nearly seven years ago. 

It seems so poignantly relevant this week, given the recent US election. 

http://dopamineproject.org/2012/06/chimpanzees-and-congressional-republicans-the-power-of-inferiority/#comment-2085

Also, this website is one of my all-time favourites, I highly recommend you read basically everything they've ever posted. 

What's interesting to me especially is that in the aftermath of the election, the Democrats on my social media feed and in groups I participating in are experiencing something very different right now from post-election dopamine flow from Biden's victory. What I'm actually seeing en masse might actually be more likened to a sudden quieting of the dopamine overload that we've all experienced for the last several years.  

Feminism is a Discipline

OK, so I've been considering for the last couple of weeks what to start this blog back up with - there's been so much going on in my head for the last while that I'm finding it a challenge to unjumble it all to choose a topic to start with. Today it came to me. 

A few weeks ago I visited my mom and brother's family out of town. Its been quite some time since I've travelled up there, its a long way and with COVID and my work situation it hasn't been easy to get away. Anyway, normally we visit with some of their friends while I'm up there, so I asked, "What's going on with Mr and Mrs X?" (for reasons that will soon become clear, I will refrain from using their names). I got the scoop. 

The short version of the story was that Mrs X recently told Mr X that she wanted a divorce - (NO!) - and she declared to him that not only was she going to keep the house and the kids, he was going to pay her bills for her - (NO!!) - and I mean, not just give her money, ACTUALLY pay her bills so she didn't have to be burdened by this responsibility (...say WHAT...?). 

I wasn't aware of this, but she hasn't been able to work for quite a while as she has a physically debilitating disease, so she has been financially dependent on Mr X (as well as a small disability pension) for years. Anyway, apparently since declaring her demands, she has been broadcasting to her friends that she is such an empowered woman now. Strong. Yes, that's right - a feminist.  

So it was at this point in the chronicle that I nearly dropped my gin and tonic. Mouth agape, I stood up, fumed, paced around a while, and then launched into another of my signature lectures on "The Wrongness of All of This"(tm). Its been percolating in the back of my mind ever since, and I just feel like I need to get it down on paper here. 

I was shocked of course by the demise of what I thought was a pretty solid relationship, and about the heartbreak of a very decent guy that didn't deserve to be shit on like this by the mother of his children. But what really stuck in my craw was her identification with feminism. How the heck did she get that idea in her head?  How can a woman who intends to spend the rest of her days dependent on a man's finances have the gall to call herself empowered, just because she is divorced? That isn't even close to what feminism is!

I can only imagine that she must have been complaining to a girlfriend or a therapist that she didn't have the confidence to leave since she cant actually fend for herself, and her therapist/friend gave her the encouragement to follow through by telling her that she was strong, and presto, suddenly, the Feminist Club has a new member!

This the story certainly did bring up some important questions that need to be answered, and really they need to be answered by "feminism" - because they've certainly been asked before - by the many angry men who have been dumped by their wives who remain dependent on them afterwards and call themselves feminists - and the answers they've come up with are really terrible, and part of the reason so many people in the world today are so anti-feminist. THIS is exactly the sort of feminist that draws so much ire in MRA circles. 

This is actually something I've been wanting to discuss for several years in a different context, but never really had the clarity of mind on the subject. I've encountered this anti-feminist anger and denial so many times over the years, as I'm sure all feminists have, and usually all we have to say is "You don't understand what feminism is!" Its such a lame thing to say unless you actually have the answer to that ever-present question: 

What is feminism exactly? Who deserves the right to call themselves one? 

This is a question that's been pondered by millions of feminists over the generations, while receiving varying degrees of verbal assault for trying to propose a definition. Many complicated answers have been offered. Here is mine, and its a very simple one. 

Feminism is the the philosophical quest for the independence of women. 

I think of it like a practice, a discipline, similar to yoga or meditation, but for the betterment of women. Its the process of developing your skills as an independent thinker, an independent actor, an independent earner. It's the movement towards full agency as an individual. 

It doesn't really sound so problematic when you put it like that, does it? Why does it generate so much anger? Why do so many women who clearly are feminists deny being one? 

Well of course, one major part of the reason is that SO many women call themselves feminist without doing the work of self-improvement. They go to a yoga class, bought themselves some Lululemon tights, and presto, they think they're a Yogi. If you stop after the first step, you aren't a feminist, you're just a person who borrowed the power of feminism to justify your decisions because you lack the strength to continue the work. 

So yes, haters, I can hear you already, saying who does she think she is telling us what feminism is?? Well, I think I'm a feminist, that's who, and I'm saying that you have to earn that title. 

I'm only saying this because the term feminist has really taken a shit-kicking over the last decade, and with absolute certainty I say that the reason is because it has become like a flag you wave to identify yourself in this culture of identity politics - a t-shirt you wear when it suits you, rather than the training of becoming a better person, which is what the point of it all was! - and that really pisses me off. 

Now don't get me wrong. I'm not putting anyone down, or kicking anyone out of the club. But I am judging. If you aren't going to move towards real independence, then you've really just abandoned the discipline after you got the limited result you wanted, and you didn't really understand feminism at all. You have not earned the right to consider yourself a feminist. 

And I'm definitely not saying if you're unhappily married that you shouldn't divorce just because you're forced to be financially dependent afterwards. I'm just saying divorcing your husband doesn't make you a feminist - that's just the first class you went to. Keep practicing if you want to be in that esteemed league.  

Anyway... another reason I see this concept of feminism as being problematic is because men really have historically flourished in the world as the result of women being dependent - the "dependent female" identity is the partner to the traditionalist "heroic male" identity. If women don't need men, then what purpose do men serve? 

This is not an insult to men, not at all. I DEFINITELY do not believe that men aren't capable of success without it. But no one can deny that they have historically become accustomed to it, they have built their mythological identity upon it, and an unfortunate many of them have not yet figured out how to be "men" in their own right without relating to this masculine identity. 

I can definitely see why women's independence creates a problem for some of these men, but it is my genuine hope that men can find their way to be something beyond this stagnant identity. I believe in the "Independent Man" too, I don't think its necessary for him to hate feminism to become one, and I think that we can find our way to live in this world together and love each other without dependency or role playing. But it only works if we are willing to grow beyond the identity politics. 

 Maybe that's just a dream, but its a great dream. I dream we can all be better people if we cast the old traditions aside that keep us from growth. More on this another time. 

 Oy vey, its been a while. Six years to be precise. Its a timely return to semi-public life too. 

I mean to get back to writing regularly again - its a great outlet for the general spleen that I hestitate (less and less successfully!) to vent on my social compadres who mostly don't want to hear such serious talk. I guess if you're coming to a blog about politics, religion, and philosophy, you're kind of asking for it, so consider yourself forewarned. There seems to be an abundance of blogfodder these days too, I'm spilling over. 

Its very likely that I will NEVER talk about masks or social distancing here, aside from maybe to discuss the COVID-19 impact on my own mental health, so if you're here looking for advice on how to deal, you won't get any. Its been eight months, you should already know what the smart move is. 

Anyway, I bought a cute little 1940's-built house last year to renovate, so I do have many tales give you many tales of fixing, weed pulling, and experiments with the garden harvest.  Its been so spiritually rewarding - a blessing in stressful times to have something to put some creative energy into - choosing paint colours, installing light fixtures, growing veggie starts, then seeing it all come to fruition. I've brought out the canner many times this fall to aid with my astonishing bounty of tomatoes. 

I'm surprisingly glad also, in the current political climate especially, to have a little piece of land to compound up in for the zombie apocalypse - the feeling of relief is actually palpable, I really recommend it if you are suffering from anxiety over the current state of affairs in the world. I write to you from Vancouver Island specifically, and the Comox Valley to be more precise, which even in the context of the idyllic Vancouver Island is sort of like a piece of paradise (photo), so that is helping to keep me grounded during the political turbulence. It feels good to be physically separated from urban chaos by a large body of water. Even though Vancouver isn't exactly chaotic (yet), it is my genuine belief that when STHF, the big cities are going to be ground zero. 

Paradise aside, I have watched in horror these past several years from my little compound, as every prediction I made becomes made real (see my post on post-millennial evangelism here). The current state of affairs in our once-great neighbouring country is philosophically distressing, and it is alarming to me how many times The Handmaids Tale (not the TV show, the amazing novel by Canadian Great Margaret Atwood - required reading for anyone with an interest in politics)  has creeped into conversation recently. 

Not much that I can do about it all though, sadly, aside from poke the fire of dissent with my metaphorical stick - which I do on the regular. I revel in it, even though it makes me kind of sick and sad to have to do so, but I feel I have no real choice. Acceptance is not an option. 

My love affair with cheese - a bitter end, or everything in moderation?

Saddened by the apparent realization that I may be lactose intolerant.

My recent spate of excessive red meat and cheese consumption left me with some pretty serious heartburn, so I went on a bit of a liver/gall bladder detox to try to re-balance (add: cucumbers, pears and beets; delete: red meat, cheese, refined sugar and chocolate), and within a single day I felt like a new woman.

So of course, to celebrate, I had a seemingly harmless bowl of granola and milk for breakfast. BAM! Heartburn again. Could be the granola, I guess, but what are the chances, really?

This truly does suck. If my life has no cheese in it, I'm not sure how I'll go on. But at least it will help me get better prepared for the post-apocalyptic shortage of luxury goods.

Anyway, I guess for the time being I'll lay low on the milk and cheese, but hopefully it won't mean we have to break up. 

Watermelon-strawberry! Holy mother of god, the best smoothie in the world

Post workout refuelling is always a challenge for me, since I go straight there after work, which means I get home close to. 8pm. I've been especially indulgent with the cheesy deep-fried snacks and red meat this last couple of weeks, so my system is telling me its time to detox.

Enter the watermelon strawberry smoothie!!


I bought a watermelon a couple of months back, and couldn't finish it all before it turned to crap, so I chopped it up and froze it. Same with my last pack of strawberries. As a single girl, it's difficult to get through that big a portion unless I have a bender. A watermelon bender.

Anyway, here's the goods:

- half a cup (ish) of frozen watermelon chunks
- half a cup (ish) of frozen strawberries
- 1/3 a cup (ish) of plain low fat yogurt (my preference is Liberte brand, but Greek style is fine too, just not that crappy watery junk)
- 1 cup (ish) of Sunripe watermelon strawberry juice

Blend to a liquid consistency. Consume, and moan in ecstasy. I feel instantly redeemed for the cheeseburger I had for lunch!

You know, smoothies will be the thing I miss most after the zombie apocalypse.

By the way, I DO NOT. Recommend watermelon smoothies, or blended drinks in general, using unfrozen watermelon. It's hard to believe it could be so different.

Caramel coffee martini

Well what a surprise this little experiment was! The inspiration for this recipe came to me while I was in the liquor store, looking all bewildered and amazed at the enormous array of flavored vodkas! So much to choose from! I stumbled across the salted caramel, and that was it, I just knew.

My friend Brad came over to test recipes with me, and the first one was so good we didn't try anything else all night. Just lots and lots of the same one. The amazing thing is, I have no hangover today!

Anyway...


Fill your martini jigger half full with ice, and in it, place the following:

 - 4 parts Stoli "Salted Caramel" vodka (oh my lord, sooo good)
 - 1 part Kahlua
 - 3 parts half and half

Shake, pour. Makes enough for two large-ish martinis, or three normal size ones. My pitiful little martini glasses are so small that I got four out of it.

I sprinkled on some ground rock salt, and some grated dark chocolate shavings, which were delicious, but I think too messy and way too much work for what they contributed overall. Another idea might be to melt some chocolate and dip the rims in it, and chill the glasses to set it, but holy cow does that ever sound like too much work.


The awesome part of the shavings was that when the martini was finished, the residual shavings looked just like a glass full of ants! Mmmmm!


If you were feeling really decadent, you could top this with some whipped cream, but that's a little too much fat for my liking. I'm trying to reduce the muffin top before my summer vacation. Really, martinis are not the best way to do that.

The next Salted Caramel recipe to test is going to be something with root beer or Dr. Pepper.