Roasted Cauliflower Mac and Cheese Casserole Recipe
Roasted cauliflower mac and cheese makes a delicious weeknight meal. Make this skinny cauliflower with the French cheesy bechamel sauce. Pop it into the oven to roast and watch the crispy cheese crust impatiently with a fork in the hand while it's bubbling in the oven. Meatless comfort food.
Cut off the green parts of your cauliflower and break the florets into smaller pieces. Wash the cauliflower bits to remove impurities. Keep a pot of water to boil then place the florets into the water and simmer for 5 minutes. Remove from the heat and leave the cauliflower in the hot water until further use.
To prepare the cheese sauce, grab a saucepan, add the butter and let the butter melt. then add the flour and whisk to a smooth paste on a very low heat (it should not cook or burn!). Next, over medium heat, pour in the milk batch by batch and keep on whisking the content until all the milk has been used up and the content is well incorporated.
Then let the sauce be over low heat and season with grated nutmeg, salt, and black pepper.
Allow the sauce to thicken gradually over slow heat by still whisking through the sauce frequently. The bottom of the pan shouldn't burn on and nor should the milk overcook. You will notice the sauce thickening. Once it's thick enough (let it still be a bit liquid) add ⅔ of the 80 grams of grated cheese into the sauce and mix well. The other ⅓ grated cheese will be used for the casserole topping. The sauce is ready!
Keep your casserole dish ready and place your partially cauliflower florets into the dish. Then pour the whole bechamel sauce over the cauliflower and top with the remaining ⅓ grated cheese.
Pop into the oven and roast at 180 Celsius/356 Fahrenheit for about 15-20 minutes or until a golden crust emerges over the cauliflower mac and cheese.
Serve hot immediately.
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Notes
Double the recipe any time if you need more cauliflower mac and cheese!
Use low sodium salt to reduce the sodium intake in this recipe
Do not skip the nutmeg and black pepper, those are essential flavor givers. Besides nutmeg has been known to be a spice with comforting and relaxing properties.
For the cheese, you can use something like Emmenthal, cheddar, raclette, gruyere, Monterey comté, and even mozzarella. In fact, you can be bold and try one of these suggested cheese varieties in a stronger flavor variation. We usually use something like an Emmenthal in Europe but of course, you can try the cauliflower mac and cheese with 2-3 cheese variations combined too. The cheese picked changes the whole dish completely!