Roast Cauliflower Soup with Pomegranate & Za’atar

A very warm welcome to our newest contributor, Tamara, creator of the magnificent ‘ Salt of the Hearth ‘ food blog, which has a wonderful selection of vegetarian and vegan recipes. Look out for more innovative recipes from Tamara, coming soon. Roast Cauliflower Soup with Pomegranate & Za’atar Author: Courtesy of Salt of the Hearth Blog Serves: 4 I decided to try it out in a soup which elevates this humble vegetable into something particularly special. I have made this recipe with both fresh and frozen cauliflower and both work a treat. If you’re considering making this soup in a large batch then the latter is really worth considering; it’s ready washed and far more economical. You can roast the cauliflower straight from frozen. Ingredients SOUP: 1kg cauliflower; washed, dried and broken into florets 3 tbsp extra virgin olive oil 2 small red onions; diced 1 large garlic clove; crushed 1 tsp freshly ground nutmeg (if possible, if not ready-ground will be fine too) 1200ml boiling water 4 tsp bouillon powder TOPPING: 1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil 1 large pita bread salt and pepper handful of pomegranate seeds za’atar Instructions Pre-heat your oven to 190° and line a large baking tray with parchment paper. Douse your cauliflower florets in half of the olive oil and mix. Spread the florets out on your baking tray. I find that the trick with roasting vegetables is to make sure there is space around them; if they are too cramped they’ll steam instead of roast. They’ll need around 20-25 minutes – you’ll know they’re reading when they develop a crispy darkened exterior like you can see in the first couple of images above. Now, you really can stop right here if you like – these golden nuggets of deliciousness are so moorish that it’s all I can do not to demolish the whole lot at this first step. If you actually want to make the soup, the next step is to use the remaining oil to fry off your onions and garlic, along with your freshly grated nutmeg, in a large saucepan. They need around 10 minutes on a medium heat until they’re soft and translucent. Dissolve the bouillon powder in the boiling water and pour into your saucepan. Bring back to the boil and add the roasted cauliflower. The soup can now be removed from the heat and pureed using a hand blender or liquidizer. It’s really well worth blending the soup for quite a while to achieve a pleasingly silky consistency. Adorn your soup with a smattering of croutons, pomegranate seeds and a liberal sprinkling of za’atar 3.2.2802