A recipe from one of my cookbooks. Showing you that you don’t need meat to have cutlets, steak or a satisfying meal. For this recipe you need firm, fresh and big cauliflowers that you can cut into 1cm thick slices. Before breading the cutlets you have to season them very well with lots of ground nutmeg, salt and pepper. Deep fry and serve with a delicious, bright, tangy salsa verde and there you have it. The perfect summer meal. It truly is delicious if I may say so..

When slicing the cauliflowers heads you’ll have some cauliflower left over that you can’t use for steaks. You can use them for other purposes like, soups, roasting or raw for salads. Don’t throw it away!

Make sure to slice the cauliflower with a sharp knife and handle gently, sometimes they fall apart if the cauliflower is not firm enough.

Season the cutlets very well, you have to actually overseason them almost. Otherwise they don’t have any flavor after frying them. So don’t be shy with the ground nutmeg, salt and pepper.

When it comes to breading I like to keep it simple, whisk together some flour and water until it has the thickness of a pancake batter, coat the seasoned cutlets into the mix then toss them in the breadcrumbs. The simpler the better, you can season the flour mix with some salt and pepper if you like but if you season the cauliflower enough you don’t need to.

This recipe is actually inspired on the “cotoletta alla Milanese”, when I went to Milan for the time we went to a local restaurant that only served traditional dishes. I ordered this “cotoletta alla Milanese” which is not vegan, I was not vegan back then. It is one of he most known dishes in Milan. They also call this dish “orecchio di elefante” which means “elephant ear” because of this cutlets size. It was literally twice my head. So when you are going to make this recipe, try and find the biggest cauliflower heads you can to have the same effect.

Recipe

For 3 people

Ingredients

For the cutlets

1 big cauliflower head
4-6 tbs olive oil
salt and pepper
3 tsp ground nutmeg
100 gr flour
150 ml water
300 gr of breadcrumbs
sunflower oil for frying

For the salsa verde

1 bundle of fresh flat leaf parsley
2 big gherkins
1 tbs of capers
1 medium sized garlic clove
50 ml white wine vinegar
125-150 ml olive oil
salt and pepper to taste

How to

Start making the salsa verde by placing all of the ingredients into a blender and blend until smooth but still a little chunky. Set aside in the fridge until you’re ready to serve.
Remove the leaves from the cauliflower head and chop of the stalk. Place the cauliflower with the stem part on a cutting board and start slicing the head into slices of 1-2 cm thick.
You should have 3-4 (depending on the size of your cauliflower) “cutlets” that don’t fall apart. Use the remaining cauliflower for something else.
Season the “cutlets” with a generous amount of olive oil, salt, pepper and the nutmeg on both sides.
Whisk together the flour and water until a thick pancake batter concistency.
Cover the seasoned cutlets in the flour mix then cover them in breadcrumbs.
Heat up the sunflower oil in a frying pan, the cutlets should almost be submersed in the oil wile frying so add enough.
Once hot, dip in a wooden spoon when it sizzles the oil is hot enough, fry the cutlets one by one on each side until they are tender, cripsy and golden brown.
Remove from the pan and leave them on some kitchen paper to absorb excess oil.
Season with salt and pepper, serve with the salsa verde.
Buon appetito!