Recipe: Cauliflower cheese

Cauliflower cheese. Photo / Doug Sherring

This is a good old standby and a great way to get kids to eat cauliflower. The cheese sauce, to which you could add snippets of bacon if you wished, gives this vegetable a rich coating.

I like to cook the cauliflower whole in a pot of salted water until it is just tender. Drain it well but keep the water to use in the sauce.

Serves 4-6

Preheat your oven to 180C. Place the drained cauliflower in a deep oven proof baking or casserole dish.

To make the sauce

1. Melt 100g of butter in a saucepan.

2. Whisk in 4 tablespoons of plain flour, stirring constantly over a medium heat. This will come together as a solid "paste" called a roux. Keep cooking this for two minutes to cook out the floury taste.

3. Warm 2 cups of a mix of your cooking water and milk or cream, or a combination of all 3. Once warm, start whisking this mix into your roux. The sauce will thicken and should be smooth. If you have a few lumps, strain it through a sieve and return it to the pan.

4. Season well with salt and pepper and add a good handful of grated tasty cheese. Keep stirring, melting the cheese into the sauce.

5. When well combined, pour this over the cauliflower. Top with a bit more grated cheese.

6. Add some breadcrumbs if you like and maybe some diced bacon.
7 Place the dish into the middle of your oven and bake until the sauce is bubbly and a little browned.