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The "pith" of the cauliflower

When using cauliflower in a recipe, there is a lot of preparation work at the beginning: removing the leaves, taking the tops or florets, etc.

It's a bit tedious, but in the end you're left with the best of the cauliflower, ready to be used in your recipe.

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Keywords for this post:Cauliflower Vegetables Broccoli Recovery Trimmings Leftovers Use

Last modified on: February 5^th 2022

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The "pith" of the cauliflower

We usually go through these 3 steps:

chou fleur brut chou fleur sans les feuilles les sommités duchou fleur

And it is only afterwards that the recipe really begins, the tops go into the cooking process for example.
But once we're done, the work surface is covered with cauliflower leaves and trimmings, and in particular with this:

la moelle du chou fleur

Which is the center rib of the cauliflower, on which all the heads you patiently cut and removed were hanging.
This big white thing, which french chefs curiously call "the pith", we would be tempted to throw it in the compost with the rest of the trimmings, but that would be a shame.

In fact, it can be eaten, like the tops, you just have to cut it into pieces and then treat it like the rest of the cauliflower.

la moelle du chou fleur taillée

You will notice that, depending on the freshness of the cauliflower, it is slightly harder than the rest, but don't worry: start cooking with only the pith for 1 minute, and then continue by adding the rest, in the usual way.
Note that this process can be applied to other cabbages: broccoli, romanesco among others.

To sum up: Do not throw away the center of cauliflower, broccoli or romanesco cabbage, this part can be cooked with the rest of the vegetable.

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