Cauliflower & Eggs (Burma)

I know, this title doesn't particularly sell this dish.  That's what we thought too.  The selling point for us was that it's incredibly fast to make and involves very few ingredients.  Cauliflower, eggs, onion and soy sauce.  Simple right? Just a very odd mixture where we were concerned. 

Like I said, it was very simple to make.  

First, you break the cauliflower into flourettes and soak them in water.  This step would have taken me at least 15 minutes, 10 of them probably just figuring out the best way to separate the cauliflower from the leaves. Luckily for me, Soph was doing this part and before I could even finish reading this bit of the recipe, Soph had already done all the work. 

As for soaking the flourettes in water, I've never done this before but I assume the only purpose behind it is so that they absorb water and I imagine that makes them fry better. But I may have just made this up. 

Then you fry up the onions, then add the cauliflower and fry that in soy for a couple of minutes before adding a little water and leaving it to cook with the lid on for a little while. 

When the cauliflower's cooked, you add the eggs and stir until they're cooked. This, obviously, doesn't take very long when you're cooking on a high heat - just long enough to snap one or two pictures before you risk overcooking the egg. 

Et voilà - you have Burmese cauliflower and eggs. 


Because of the soy sauce, we assumed it was a Chinese-style dish and served it with chicken fried rice, which worked superbly. Actually, Allegra recommends serving it with a curry, which Soph thinks would also work well. I, however, have been refusing to eat curries since I was little so I would always prefer it with Chinese flavours. 

There's no doubt it was an odd combination - we'd certainly never had cauliflower cooked this way before - but the result was definitely interesting. It wasn't bad but I also wouldn't say I have been converted to cooking cauliflower this way in the future. It takes a lot to beat cauliflower cheese in this household but it was fun to try a different method of cooking so we may well branch out again in the future.