The Great Millet Mash Fiasco of 2010

Here we are again, Big E and I, both working our little hearts out, trying to get back into better shape. For me, it's the launch of my running year. For Big E, it's his build-up to Paga. And as always, as we start to throw all of our efforts into working out more, and start feeling better and stronger, I start to ponder our nutrition again.

We generally eat pretty well, pretty healthfully. I cook fairly often, we get a fabulous veggie box that I've gotten better and better at using up, and I do tons of research and reading on the best nutrition for athletes for my hopefully upcoming cookbook.

The key things I work on improving whenever I'm paying attention are increasing the variety of vegetables, relying on leaner proteins (and eating a vegetarian diet more frequently) and incorporating more whole grains.

The last of those options took me on a bit of a wild goose chase yesterday. I had a lovely head of green cauliflower and decided to check out a recipe I'd seen in The New Whole Grain Cookbook, a millet and cauliflower mash that pretended to be mashed potatoes. Now, I'd like to point out for the record that while I love mashed potatoes, I'm also quite fond of puréed cauliflower and don't think it needs to disguise itself as anything else. Cauliflower purée is definitely better for you that most mashed potatoes and the texture is silky smooth and the flavour is delicately delicious. So there.

That being said, I love millet and thought doing this blend could take a good thing (cauliflower purée) and make it even better by adding the whole graininess, little bit of protein and loads of nutrients that millet contains.

That didn't really happen. I started out by following the recipe to the word: 1/2 cup of millet (rinsed) to 4 oz of cauliflower (roughly chopped) to 2 1/2 cups of water and a pinch of salt. After I cooked and puréed it, it was terribly thick and gluey. A horrible texture and the lovely delicate cauliflower taste was gone. It didn't resemble mashed potatoes either.

I tried and tried to salvage the recipe (adding more liquid, adding some butter, add some cream...) None of things worked - it was just a big porridgey sticky mess. I'll probably try again, my guess is the ratio of millet to cauliflower was off, so I think I would try halving the amount of millet next time. I'll keep you posted.

The thought I'd like to leave you with is this: whole grains like millet, quinoa and amaranth are fabulous things to swap into your diet if you're on a fitness kick. They're packed with nutrients, much better for you than rice or pasta and they can really taste delicious. I've been swapping them into all kinds of recipes with much better success than this story. I think the key is using them in situations where you'd normally use rice or couscous, boiled or steamed as a side dish or under a lovely sauce. As for the more advanced moves, like trying to sneak grains in odd places and have them masquerade as other creatures (barley chocolate mousse, anyone?), maybe it's good to hold off until some really solid recipes are found. I'm a bit skeptical about the whole grain book, but am not giving up yet! As I experiment, I'll definitely tell you about the winners.