What once was a novelty can be found in almost any vegetable freezer section of a grocery store: cauliflower rice. I would presume that the idea of packaging already “riced” cauliflower was invented after many Americans sought after a diet with less carbohydrates and more fiber. I’m all about a higher intake of fiber and I do love cauliflower (it’s one of my favorite cruciferous vegetables), which is why I gave it a shot. But after trying it, there seemed to be something unexciting and even misleading about the product.
First off, it shouldn’t be called cauliflower rice. When we label it as “rice”, we expect the product to act like rice, but it definitely does not have that chewy-with-a-bite texture to it. Also, because of cauliflower’s high water content, it is more difficult to brown the “rice” without it becoming mushy first. Basically, I have a few qualms with its texture, and I wish they gave it a different name because it’s not fair to invite the comparison to real rice.
While I don’t think that anyone should force themselves to eat something simply because it’s healthy, I did feel a sort of obligation to figure out how to work with it and hopefully, eventually, learn to love cauliflower rice because of my affection for the vegetable itself.
I began to think of other ways I could use cauliflower rice besides on its own. It does act as a great shortcut for making cauliflower crusted pizza. I thought about how it would do well if incorporated into a homemade veggie burger (I’ll work on a recipe for that).
I remembered that I often used cauliflower rice for fried rice, but it almost always comes out more pasty and soft than desired. Then, the other night, I grabbed my long grain brown rice to make a batch of real fried rice and as I was bringing the water to a boil, it dawned on me: put cauliflower rice in with the brown rice. After the rice was done cooking, I quickly added in a full bag of frozen cauliflower rice and I increased the amount of seasoning I would normally put in for fried rice to accommodate the higher volume of food. And there it was: tasty fried rice. A more nutritious fried rice. A fried rice where I didn’t have to sacrifice the right texture and I was still getting the chance to fit in a necessary dose of carbohydrates.
Turns out, cauliflower rice can be used to enhance a dish, especially from a nutritional standpoint, and it does a stellar job at absorbing the flavors around it. Now I see that the goal isn’t to hide it, but to experiment and try cauliflower rice in different mediums so it can act as a great sneaky fibrous sidekick to any meal.
