Roasted Cauliflower With Chilli Sauce and Tahini

1. Heat the oven to 220°C, or 200°C fan, and slide a large heavy tray in to heat with it.
2. Trim the base of the cauliflower and pull off the leaves, keeping the smaller pale ones.
3. Stand the cauliflower on its base and cut down through the stalk into wedges about 3cm thick at the outside edge, cutting through the core so each wedge holds together.
4. Toss the wedges and the reserved leaves with the olive oil, the salt and the Aleppo chilli, rubbing the oil into the cut faces.
5. Pull out the hot tray and lay the wedges on it flat side down in a single layer, with a finger of space between them. Two trays beat one crowded one.
6. Roast for 20 minutes without touching them. That first stretch of contact with hot metal is where the colour comes from.
7. Turn each wedge onto its second flat face and roast for another 10 to 15 minutes, until the edges are dark and the stalk gives to a knife tip.
8. While it roasts, stir the tahini, the lemon juice and a pinch of salt together in a bowl. It will seize into a stiff paste. Keep going.
9. Add the cold water a tablespoon at a time, stirring after each one, and the paste loosens and turns pale and pourable. Stop when it runs off the spoon in a ribbon.
10. Taste the sauce and add more lemon or salt. It wants to be sharper than seems sensible, because roasted cauliflower is sweet.
11. Spread most of the tahini over a warm platter, pile the cauliflower and the crisped leaves on top and spoon the rest over.
12. Dot the chilli sauce over in small spoonfuls rather than drizzling it in lines, scatter the chopped nuts and the herbs, and serve.

Working around the oven, and the tahini that is left

Roasting ahead is covered in the questions below. The thing worth planning around is the oven: on a hot day in December it is already busy, and a festive entertaining table wants at least one vegetable that can be roasted in the morning and given ten minutes back on a hot tray at the end.

The tahini sauce keeps five days in a jar in the fridge and thickens as it sits, so stir in a spoonful of water before using it again. It dresses a chopped salad, sauces roast pumpkin or a tray of chicken thighs, and makes a decent sandwich spread. The 500g tub is more than a household gets through in hummus alone, which is why we wrote how to use tahini beyond hummus. For where a tray of cauliflower sits between the roast and the salads, see Christmas side dishes.

Common questions

How do you get cauliflower to brown properly?

Three things, in the order they matter. Dry cut faces, because surface water has to boil off before browning can start. Real contact with hot metal, which is why the tray goes into the oven empty and the wedges go on flat side down. And space, because a crowded tray traps steam, and steamed cauliflower stays pale and goes soft. Florets brown only at their tips; wedges cut through the core give two broad flat faces each, which is where the colour lives.

Can I roast the cauliflower ahead and reheat it?

Yes, and it holds up better than most vegetables. Take it out about five minutes short, spread it on the tray to cool so it does not steam itself soft, and leave it at room temperature for up to three hours. Reheat on a hot tray at 220°C for 8 to 10 minutes and dress it after that, never before. Avoid refrigerating it if you can, because cold cauliflower sweats on the way back up and the second roast has to dry it out again.

Is this dish vegan?

As written the method uses cauliflower, olive oil, lemon, salt, herbs and two jarred products, so nothing in the cooking is an animal product. What we cannot do is tell you what is inside the jar you are holding, because recipes on packs change: read the ingredient lists on the chilli sauce and the spiced nuts if someone at the table is strict about it. Worth flagging separately, tahini is ground sesame, so this is not a dish for a sesame allergy and no swap keeps the flavour.

Ottolenghi Chilli Sauce is $15.95 for a 170g jar and this recipe uses about a fifth of it. It lives with the rest of the Ottolenghi range, next to our sauces and mixes and the wider condiments shelf. Shipping is free Australia-wide on orders over $100.