Roasted Garlic Mashed Cauliflower

Roasted Garlic Mashed Cauliflower. It's creamy, and roasty, and garlicky with a slightly nutty flavor, and a way to get your kids to eat vegetables when their food group preferences consist of all things white and tan. Winner, winner, cauliflower dinner.

And don't even look at me with that questioning side-eye. This is not that recipe blog where I tell you to give up mashed potatoes.

May we NEVER give up mashed potatoes. NEVVVVUUURRRR....

Glad we cleared that up.

This garlicky roasted mashed cauliflower is in ADDITION to our bowl of mashed potatoes. It's like a double rainbow at our holiday dinner. Intense man, I know.

Plus, it's ridiculously easy! And it's a rebellion against the masses of mashed cauliflower recipes hanging out on the interweb that have us drowning our cauli in a pot of water followed by a warning to give it a thorough pat-down or otherwise risk it turning into mashy soup.

This is not a cauli mash soup recipe. I like cauli soup. But we'll save that for another time schmoopsie.

• Unsalted butter: Using unsalted butters allows for control with much salt is needed and avoids the risk of the mashed cauliflower becoming too salty.
• Sweet onion: I love using sweet onions in many of my recipes simply because they are less pungent than other types of onions. Look for Vidalia, Walla Walla, Texas Sweet, Sweet Mayans, or Maui onions. A standard white or yellow onion will also work just fine though.
• Heavy whipping cream: A luxuriously tasty addition for thinning out the mashed cauliflower. Subsitutions for heavy whipping cream that would also work are half-and-half, whole milk, or sour cream with a couple of tablespoons of water or chicken broth.

For a full list of ingredients and quantities see the recipe card at the end of this post.

Set aside your steamer basket and your pot of water because we are gonna ROAST this cauli! YEEEAhhh! <-- just said this out loud to no one in particular in pure Hulk Hogan style, and I haven't even had my morning chai. It's gonna be a good day.

Put the dish towels, paper towels, hairdryers away. A cauli dry-out session won't be needed cuz things are getting roasted up in here!

No, not us. The cauli is getting roasted. Not in that way. Huh? Never mind.

I haven't had my morning chai yet.

The key to creating amazing flavor in this luscious mash is in the roasting. Those golden brown edges on the cauliflower are what we are going for. Gives it depth. And we are deep people. After we've had a morning chai.

But you're probably a coffee person.

All we're gonna do is spread out the cauli florets on a sheet pan with slices of sweet onion and several unpeeled garlic cloves. Just nestle them all in there together. Cuz more flavor. And more depth. And happy little cauli trees of roastiness. We're getting giddy pants now.

Once everything is roasty and we've marveled at the ease of this recipe, things become even more stupid simple.

Just pop the roasted garlic out of its peel and add errry lil' piece of roastiness into a high-speed blender with a little buttah and a little cream and anything else that suits your fancy mashed cauli giddy pants. And if you don't have a high-speed blender, add it to your holiday gift wish list. Or use an immersion blender. And if you don't have one of those either, add it to your holiday gift wish list. Or mash it Hulk Hogan style with your fists.

No, don't do that.

Roasted Garlic Mashed Cauliflower --> It's creamy, it's flavorful, it's roasted, it's a way to fool your kids into eating their veggies (#parenthack), and it DEFINITELY deserves a place at the table with your holiday meal.

Right next to the mashed potatoes. Cuz double rainbow, man.