Cauliflower & Bacon Macaroni Cheese

This is fairly close to the recipe in the August 08 issue of Australian Good Taste, but I'll give you what I actually did, and not what it says. ;)

350g penne
1/2 cauliflower, broken into small florets
2 tbsp olive oil spread (or marg, or butter)
175g bacon, finely chopped
1 onion, finely chopped
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
250g cream cheese (that's one "brick")
2 1/2 cups milk
1 tbsp Dijon mustard (but I used a big squeeze of dijonnaise)
160g grated tasty cheese

Cook pasta in salted water until not quite done. (8 minutes, or whenever you have finished chopping cauliflower). Add the cauliflower to the pot, and cook until desired done-ness of pasta (in this house that means almost soggy, definitely past 'al dente').
Melt butter/marg/spread in a saucepan, and cook the bacon, onion and garlic until the onions are soft. Whisk in the cream cheese, milk and mustard.
Place pasta and the grated cheese in a baking dish, retaining about 1/2 cup of cheese to sprinkle on top just before baking. Mix through, then add the bacon sauce, mixing that through as well. Sprinkle remaining cheese on top.
Either place under a grill for 5 minutes, or if your grill is too small, like mine, place in a 180°C oven for around 10 minutes, or until the cheese melts.

Feeding the family

Both kids emptied their plates. Miss Two had seconds. I had enough for the freezer to feed both kids on a night when dinner doesn't happen for whatever reason. And everyone was happy. We like our veggie dishes in this house. Now I just need to go and wash all those cheese dishes :(

Cauliflower soup and homemade rolls

Cauliflower Soup
50g butter
1 onion
pinch of caraway seeds
50g plain flour
3 litres water.
3 beef cubes
1/2 cauliflower
1 potato

Melt butter, fry onion and seeds. Add flour, add water slowly. Crumble in beef cubes. Add vegies and mash all together. Cook until vegies are cooked and soup is thick.

At least, that's how my sister sent it to me in an email years ago. I usually don't try to mash the vegies before cooking them. I just boil the lot till the vegies are mushy, then use a stick blender in the pot (take the pot off the heat source first!), or if I'm feeling pedantic, I'll pour it in a blender. A blender needs to do a few batches, because this makes quite a bit of soup, and you have to be careful with hot liquids and blenders.

And to go with, I made rolls for the second time ever! Last year, for winter solstice, I made bread rolls from scratch, following the recipe on the back of the yeast box. They were so-so... didn't rise quite enough in our cold kitchen in the middle of winter.
Today, I just used my usual bread recipe, but used the dough setting on my bread maker, instead of bread. Since it was so hot, I had no problem getting them to rise. And they came out of the oven right before dinner... mmm, melty butter goodness!