Chantilly Cauliflower

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Want to get some twist to your old mashed cauliflower — in an easy and fun way? Then don’t let the fancy name of this dish freak you out: just read on and find out how this simple recipe will surprise you with its easiness and scrumptiousness.

How to make the Chantilly Cauliflower

First, let’s take a look at how to prepare this delicious dish. After that, I will give some extra tips to help you achieve the best result.

Take 1/2 cup (120 ml) heavy cream.

Whip it…

…until stiff peaks form.

Next, you’ll need 3 cups (about 700 ml) mashed cauliflower. Here, I’ve simply cooked some frozen cauliflower and mashed it with an immersion blender. If you wonder how much cauliflower to cook and mash to get that 3 cups (yep, about 700 ml), you’ll need approximately 1 1/2 lbs (680 g) cauliflower.

Add the whipped cream.

Add also 1 cup (240 ml) shredded Swiss cheese (or other sharp cheese). In my opinion, Swiss cheese is the best match with cauliflower.

Season to taste. I prefer to add about 1 teaspoon Himalayan salt…

…and plenty of white pepper.

Stir gently with a rubber spatula…

…until well combined. I said gently! When stirring the ingredients together, do it carefully to retain as much of the fluffiness of the whipped cream as you can.

Transfer the mixture into a 2-qt (2 L) baking dish.

Level the surface.

Like this.

Sprinkle 1 cup (240 ml) shredded Swiss cheese evenly on top.

Ready to bake.

Bake at 350 °F (175 °C) about 40 minutes, or until golden and even on top.

Remove from the oven.

Let set for 5-15 minutes and serve.

Yum!

And now those few extra tips I was talking about:

If you happen to have ready whipped cream (naturally unsweetened whipped cream!), you can use 1 cup (240 ml) whipped cream to this dish. You might know that cream doubles its volume when whipped, so the 1/2 cup (120 ml) cream used in the recipe makes 1 cup (240 ml) whipped cream.

Be sure that your mashed cauliflower is not watery. So, when you have cooked your cauliflower, drain it super-extra carefully to ensure you’ll get all the water out. Watery mashed cauliflower means watery dish, so double-check you’ve got no excess water left with your cooked cauliflower before mashing it.

Naturally, if you have already prepared a mashed cauliflower side, you can use the leftovers for this dish. In that case, pay attention to the amount of the seasonings you are going to add to this dish, as your mashed cauliflower most probably contains already a substantial amount of salt — and possibly other spices as well.

How I came up with this recipe

When developing side dish recipes to my upcoming Finnish keto book, I was pondering over cauliflower sides — especially something made with mashed cauliflower as it is one of the staples in the keto kitchen. However, since I already have a basic mashed cauliflower recipe in my very first book, I wanted to develop a variation of mashed cauliflower to my newest book.

This time, I was after something with a twist, yet it should be an easy recipe, I insisted. Suddenly, I remembered a classic recipe for Chantilly Potatoes. As cauliflower makes the perfect keto substitute for potatoes, I concluded the Chantilly Potato recipe should undoubtedly work with mashed cauliflower, too.

In addition to obvious potatoes, Chantilly Potatoes contain heavy cream and shredded cheese. Some recipes call for several types of cheese, and some include spices and seasonings. Some use just potatoes, cream, and cheese (plus salt). For my keto version, I decided to use only one type of cheese — Swiss cheese, which has a strong flavor and is my absolute favorite type of cheese (in addition to feta!). Swiss cheese melts beautifully, and thus it’s perfect for warm, savory dishes.

So, now I had three ingredients: cauliflower, heavy cream, and cheese. I also needed salt and maybe another seasoning, like black pepper. On the other hand, white pepper matches better the flavor world of cauliflower and cheese, so I decided to go with that.

I cooked a few pounds of cauliflower and mashed it. Now, my problem was whether to add the mashed cauliflower to the baking dish and the mixture of cream and cheese on top — like in most of the Chantilly Potato recipes — or mix all the ingredients well together and then transfer into the baking dish. As my mashed cauliflower didn’t have any seasonings, or even salt, I thought just a layer of unseasoned mashed cauliflower in my Chantilly Cauliflower might be too bland. Therefore, for my first experiment, I decided to mix all ingredients together and then bake until golden.

But before getting to that point, I had to decide how much of each ingredient to use. After some calculations, I decided to use 3 cups (still about 700 ml) mashed cauliflower, 1/2 cup (120 ml) heavy cream, and 1 cup (240 ml) shredded Swiss cheese.

Suddenly, I got the idea to whip the cream before adding it to the mixture — like that, the dish would be nicely fluffy. Let’s admit: mashed potatoes are fluffier than mashed cauliflower, so adding whipped cream rather than runny cream might help make the cauliflower version beautifully fluffy, I hoped.

Gently but carefully, I stirred all ingredients until well combined and seasoned the mixture with salt and white pepper to taste. To taste meant in this case 1 teaspoon Himalayan salt and about 1/8 teaspoon ground white pepper.

I was about to add some onion powder as well, but then decided to go with the combo of good old salt and pepper. Anyway, my Chantilly Cauliflower was meant to be a side dish that lets the main course shine, so I didn’t want to use too many flavors or spices there.

I transferred the cauliflower mixture into a baking dish. At least it looked terrific and fluffy. Then, I got the idea to sprinkle some more cheese on top – 1 cup (240 ml), to be exact. Well, for me, there doesn’t exist a concept of too much cheese! Besides, golden, bubbly cheese on top of any savory dish rises it to a completely different level.

So, my cheese-covered and fluffy cauliflower dish looked good so far, and it was now ready for the oven. I could only hope it turns out well — I was a bit afraid the cauliflower will release some fluid while baking, even I had tried to drain it as well as I could.

Well, I was a bit alarmed when I saw the edges of the dish rise in the oven, and the center stayed flat. I was hoping the surface would get even, and the center rises to the same level as the edges if I baked the dish long enough.

Well, luckily, it did, and after some 40 minutes, the result was just like I had hoped: the surface was golden brown, and the taste was fantastic. And the best thing was that the cauliflower was as fluffy as I had hoped — and luckily, no fluid was hiding in the bottom of the baking dish, as I had drained the cooked cauliflower very well.

Here’s the recipe for you to enjoy:

 


 

Nutrition information	In total	Per serving if 6 servings in total
Protein	79.8 g	13.3 g
Fat	111.2 g	18.5 g
Net carbs	19.9 g	3.3 g
kcal	1421 kcal	237 kcal

 

How to get some variation to the Chantilly Cauliflower recipe

This is a great recipe to use up the leftover mashed cauliflower that you might have lurking in your fridge. And not only cauliflower, but you can also use any leftover mashed or cooked veggies or veggie side dishes for this recipe to make a jazzed-up side for your next keto dinner — or lunch. For example, if you have some cooked broccoli, by all means, mix it with cream and shredded cheese and season to taste and bake into a beautiful, golden, and cheese-oozing dish.

If salt and pepper sound too boring to you, feel free to add other spices and seasonings. How about smoked paprika or chipotle? Or maybe an ample amount of chopped lovely fresh herb like thyme, rosemary, basil, or oregano? Or perhaps a handful of chopped sun-dried tomatoes for a tasty twist?

General prattling

On Monday, we were in Kuopio, Eastern Finland, developing novel keto soup products with a company called Kasvis Galleria (it always troubles me when I see the name that according to the Finnish grammar, the name should be a compound, but they write it separately, argh!). Anyway, the company makes excellent products and the people there are very helpful. They will manufacture our keto soups, as you might guess.

We prepared two batches of tasty vegetable soup — hopefully, this variation will be in stores in May. There are currently some strikes going on that delay the packaging material deliveries to factories. Well, it’s not too bad since we can develop another soup recipe and launch two soup products at the same time. We actually wanted to prepare another test soup batch with broccoli — but as it called for almonds and the factory cannot use nuts or almonds for allergy reasons, we couldn’t make that version. So, back to the drawing board: I have to find another good and simple source of vegan protein that tastes good in soup – not forgetting smooth mouthfeel. (No worries, I already have some ideas!)

Here’s our CEO Olli happily mixing our soup experiments:

And here we’ve got the test batches packed in real soup containers as they will appear in stores (they will still get a cardboard wrapping). Looks good!

Next week, I will make some edits to my keto book, after which my editor will check the manuscript carefully. I’ve recently found a nice cafeteria, or actually a bistro, here in Tampere, where I’m planning to do the edits as I love to write in cafeterias or in libraries. Well, this bistro is the first-ever place I’ve seen offering keto treats here in Finland, so I guess it will be my new favorite place!

Oh yes: next Saturday, 15^th Feb, I will talk about my new keto-vegan book (Kasvisruokien KETO-käsikirja) in the Academic Bookstore in Helsinki. You are warmly welcome to meet me and have a chat!
 
Last-minute update: My Finnish book Kasvisruokien KETO-käsikirja just appeared from print right in time for the Minä Olen 2020 expo where I’m currently, and soon going to talk about the ketogenic diet. Here’s the happy author: