Cauliflower

Cauliflower is a close cousin of cabbage, but it never bothered with green. What you eat is the tightly bunched, undeveloped flower head — pale and dense, closer to a bud that hasn't decided what to become. Growers wrap the outer leaves over the head as it grows, shielding it from light, and that's the real reason it stays that soft ivory white. No sun, no green.

Choose it by touch and look, not by size. The head should feel heavy and firm, curds pressed tightly together, no gaps, no give when you press it. Colour should be even, ivory or cream, no brown freckles, no grey patches. Leaves around the base should look fresh, not limp. Smell it too — a good cauliflower smells faintly sweet, or of almost nothing. A sharp, sulphurous smell means it's old.

Some people say cauliflower is bland and needs drowning in cheese sauce to taste of anything. No! Raw or lightly cooked, it has a clean, nutty sweetness of its own. That misconception leads people to boil it into grey mush, then bury the flavour they killed under sauce, instead of roasting it hard and hot, where it turns golden and genuinely delicious.