Pecorino Mashed Cauliflower with Sherry-Rosemary Mushrooms

This healthy, 21 Day Fix mashed cauliflower is spiked with sharp pecorino cheese and topped with rich, rosemary and sherry infused mushrooms. Perfect for any night of the week or even your Thanksgiving table! 

Hey foodies! It's fall break here so my kiddos are home from school all week. I'd love to say that we had the foresight to plan lots of fun things to do, but honestly, it kind of snuck up on us. Plus, this is only our second time having a fall break (because apparently, it's a thing) and we just aren't used to it yet. It's been pretty chilly here too, but if we get a decent day I'd really like to take the bikes to the park. That's about as far ahead as I've thought. Oh, and there's a new indoor play place not too far from here, so we may check that out as well. I'm pretty excited for that, actually. Allegedly, there's a rock wall and a slide that takes you from the second to first floor. Come on, doesn't that sound awesome?! Or is it just me?

Anyway, having them both home is always interesting. My eldest and I got to go shopping the other day and we had a ridiculous amount of fun. Really, shopping for a coat and blog props has no right to be such a good time and it's hard to find time for things like that normally. So that's really great. The other edge to that sword is that my girls fight. Kind of a lot. Needless to say, having both of the kiddos home has definitely lowered my productivity level ("Don't touch your sister!" "Don't make that face at your sister, you know it makes her cry!" "Please don't lay on top of  your sister!" "Please don't leave your dirty clothes in the middle of the living room!") and I have yet to manage to get one food photo taken. I really need to up my game.

Let's talk about this stupendous side dish. Is there anything better for a Fixer than a regular ol' veg masquerading as a carb? I think not, friends. You could go to freakin' town on this stuff and it would hardly cost you a thing, container-wise! Wait - there is something better... a veg, masquerading as a carb, tasting damn delicious, fooling everyone you know. Even my anti-cauliflower husband loved this dish, but let me be clear: Do these taste exactly like mashed potatoes? No. They have so much more flavor than that. Do they taste and feel like a carb? Um, yep. Would these be absolutely fantastic on your Thanksgiving table? Do I really need to answer that?

I made these the other night as a side to the Thyme Roasted Pork with Cider Sauce from Tuesday's post. I actually hadn't planned on posting this, but I was so in love with them that I had to share. You know, because I also love you fine people 🙂  I make mashed cauliflower all the time at our house, but I usually just load it up with garlic and herbs (not that there's anything wrong with that, believe me), but I happened to have a container of mushrooms on hand that didn't have a planned destination, so I decided to use them here and give my mashers some oomph. I also had some extra rosemary hanging out and since rosemary and dry sherry love each other, it was an obvious choice.

If you've never cooked with dry sherry before, you're in for a real treat. It makes your entire house smell so fantastic, it should be a Glade plug-in. And it tastes delicious. Seriously though, Glade, there's an amazing idea from me to you (though I'm fully expecting royalty checks). I'll just wait at the mailbox.

Every once in awhile I really like to make a dinner with little to no yellows (carbs) so I can use them elsewhere throughout my day. With the mashed cauliflower, I made the pork with the cider sauce and roasted green beans with shallots. The container counts per person for this meal were 1 red, 1 and ⅓ green, ½ yellow, and 1 and ⅓ teaspoon. It was a decent-sized meal that still left plenty of good stuff to use throughout the rest of my day. Here's what my entire day looked like in case any of you non-Fixers are curious:

• Breakfast: overnight oats with cinnamon apples
• Snack: sauteed spinach, onions & peppers topped with 2 over-easy eggs
• Lunch: a barbecue chicken pita pizza and a salad
• Snack: grilled peanut butter-banana roll-up
• Dinner: the aforementioned pork with cider sauce, mashed cauliflower & mushrooms and roasted green beans & shallots
• Dessert: peanut butter cheesecake with jelly sauce

Not too shabby, eh? That's a lot of food in a day. I always see this meme on FB that says, "All of my friends are starving on diets, but I'm over here on the 21 Day Fix wondering how I'm going to eat all this food." and it's so true. I've probably never eaten this much in my life (or been as healthy and fit!)

Well, I hope you guys love this one as much as we do.

Enjoy <3

If you make this 21 Day Fix Pecorino Mashed Cauliflower be sure to snap a pic and tag me @thefoodieandthefix on Instagram so I can check it out! It makes me ridiculously happy to see what you guys are making 🙂

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📖 Recipe

Pecorino Mashed Cauliflower with Sherry-Rosemary Mushrooms

Yield: 4 Servings

Prep Time: 10 minutes

Cook Time: 30 minutes

Total Time: 40 minutes

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Ingredients

Mashed Cauliflower:

• 6 cups roughly chopped cauliflower (about 1 head)
• 1 Tbs unsweetened almond milk (plain) or low-fat milk
• 2 ½ Tbs grated pecorino romano cheese
• ⅛th teaspoon salt

Sherry-Rosemary Mushrooms

• ½ of a small onion, chopped
• 4 oz mushrooms, sliced (about 2 cups sliced)
• salt and pepper, for seasoning
• 1 teaspoon fresh rosemary, chopped (dried works, too!)
• 2 Tbs dry sherry (not cooking sherry! I recommend Taylor brand)
• ½ Tbs grassfed butter

Instructions

To make the cauliflower:

1. Steam the cauliflower (you can use a metal steamer basket over the stove or put it in a microwave safe dish with a lid, add a few tablespoons of water and microwave until soft). You want the cauliflower to be SUPER SOFT! When you think it's cooked long enough, give it another minute or two 🙂 Once done, put the cauliflower in the bowl of a stand mixer (or any large bowl if you have a hand mixer - you could probably even use your blender or food processor in a pinch, but don't quote me). Add the milk, cheese and salt and mix until it basically looks like mashed potatoes. Keep warm.

For the mushrooms:

1. Spray a medium saute pan with olive oil or coconut oil cooking spray and bring to medium heat. Add in the onions and cook until tender. Add in the mushrooms, black pepper and the rosemary (not the salt yet).
2. Once the mushrooms have browned, lightly season with the salt and cook for another 30 seconds or so. Stir in the sherry and let it simmer until there is very little liquid left, then swirl in the butter and turn off the heat.
3. Top your mashed cauliflower with the sherry mushrooms and enjoy!

Notes

21 Day Fix Container Counts per Serving: ½ GREEN, ⅛ BLUE, ⅓ teaspoon (fyi, those last two are not getting counted by me, that's just silly! But I'm including them here in case you have multiple serving in a day, you may want to count them then.)

Weight Watchers Freestyle Points: 2

Nutrition Information:

Yield: 4 Serving Size: about ½ cup
Amount Per Serving: Calories: 87Total Fat: 2.8g

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