Pittule col Cavalfiore: cauliflower doughnuts

I thought I would give you something to ponder over the weekend. Cauliflower is in high season here and they are big, beautiful and cheap. I happen to really love cauliflower, but I hadn’t yet moved away from Indian and American to Italian ways with it in any sizeable way. I started looking through my various Italian regional cookbooks to see what they proposed.

I didn’t really see a lot until I reached “La Cucina Salentina”, the Pugliese cookbook I bought this autumn. Even there I wouldn’t say there was a lot, but there were certainly things to do with Cauliflower that hadn’t ever entered my mind. This recipe is one and I made it. I only made one-third of the recipe, because it looked like a lot. Let me share with you that one-third of the recipe is a lot!

It doesn’t say what you should do with them, like are they antipasto? Contorno? I don’t know, but I think I would serve them as antipasto and not expect much appetite afterwards. While I was making them I had the thought that the dough resembled my mother’s yeast doughnut dough, except a bit more liquid, so I spooned a few lumps of it into the oil then sugared them once drained. Not exactly, but very, very close. That’s why the name in English became cauliflower doughnuts. I am open to suggestions less repulsive at this point.

These are good. I expect that all the various pitulle are good, although these are the only ones I have made so far. I would urge you that if you want to make a yummy and filling treat for a crowd, you might consider pittule col cavalfiore. If, on the other hand, you are spending the next few days alone, donìt make this!

Pittule col Cavalfiore

makes a LOT

the dough:

1 boiled medoum potato, mashed or riced
300 g or 10 1/2 ounces plain flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon yeast dissolved into
250 ml or 1 cup warm water
1 tablespoon olive oil

Mix the yeast, the warm water and a handful of flour together and let it sit for a few minutes. Then mix all of the above together, using a mixer, dough hooks or a wooden spoon. It needs to end up thick but loose, like batter on the thicker side, so add in more warm water to reach that texture.

Leave it to rise for 2 to 3 hours.

Preparation:

Start heating deep oil in a very large pot. It should never be more than half full because it will bubble up when you put food into it, so use a really big pot. (or a fryer, if you have one, of course.) It needs to heat to 350°F or 175°C. If you do not have a thermometer, you should get one, because you also use it to make caramel and candy! Yum! Gnam!

Clean and cut into small florets 1/2 cauliflower of moderate size. Use your judgment if your cauliflower is very large or very small. Boil a large pot of quite salty water and blanch the cauliflower florets in it for about 1-1/2 minutes, then scoop them out with a slotted spoon and drop them into the batter.

One by one, with a solid spoon,  spoon out a floret in its chunk of dough and slide into the boiling oil. Don’t crowd them or the temp will drop too much. When they float up to the top, turn them over to brown a second side. When they look like the picture above, use a slotted spoon to remove them to paper towels to drain. Keep making more batches until they are done. At this point a sprinkled salt and ground pepper over them. I thought about making a dip, but I didn’t.

If you have leftovers, and you will, once they are cold slip them into a plastic bag and keep them in the fridge. They can be reheated in the oven and they are quite tasty the first 2 or 3 times. After that just give them to the local birds. No one wants to eat cauliflower five days in a row.