Thai Cauliflower and Sweet Potato Flautas with Spicy Peanut Sauce

Welcome to my Bali kitchen, where Thai flavors and Mexican dishes come together and make beautiful multi-cultural children. Yeah, fo realsies. The first thing I'm blogging from Bali is MEXICAN FOOD. With Thai flavors. Are we having an identity crisis here? Maybe. Wait, NO! Not at all! We're LOVING DIVERSITY! I'm serious. I'm all about taking flavors from one country and transplanting them into a dish from another. This particular dish? Rockin'. Super rockin'. IN.SANE.

In learning to cook in my new kitchen, which means only over very high heat and only on the stovetop, there are a few things I've learned. First, frying is FAST. So be careful. It gets hot. Sometimes you need to take a break. Let that oil cool off! Hopefully you all have stoves that let you control the temperature! Second, rice will be burned. It's just a fact of life. I've never, ever, ever in my life burned a pot of rice — until now. I honestly don't know how to avoid it, with the heat THAT high on the stove! Tips? Third, there will be ants. EVERYWHERE. So, learn to love a little ant protein in your flautas. Don't tell Derek I'm feeding him ants. Oopsies!

These flautas came about partially because I saw tortillas at the grocery and was like OMG TORTILLAS MY LONG LOST LOVE JUMP INTO MY CART! And they totally did. I knew our bond was strong. They're good ol' flour tortillas like I love and adore back home! {Yes, I'm aware I have a problem. I hear that's the first step of the recovery I have no interest in achieving} The thing about buying tortillas in Indonesia, though, is that coming up with the appropriate Mexican fillings seems weird and wrong. I haven't fully sussed out the situation in the "Mexican Aisle" at the grocery store, mainly because there isn't a Mexican Aisle. There's an aisle that seems to be the "foreigners come find your weird comfort foods here!" aisle, full of expensive bottles of pesto, packages of whole wheat pasta, bottles of hot sauce, and perhaps — PERHAPS — some cans of refried beans. I'm actually wondering why I haven't gone looking for thos... you KNOW I love my refried beans! Ah — now that I'm writing this I know the answer: lack of good cheddar cheese. UGH. Lack of cheese might kill me! {Side note here: we've discovered that tons of places in Ubud deliver food FOR FREE, and two of those places are MEXICAN RESTAURANTS!!! It's not quite Chipotle at our fingertips, but I tell ya, it's better than nothing! They should probably prepare for us to order 5x per day. I mean week. NBD.}

Luckily, Thai-inspired cauliflower flautas are a darn good replacement for beans n' cheese (MY LOVES!). I had some extra veggies in the fridge after making a curry the night before, so I picked out those I thought worked together and threw 'em together for this delicious lunch/dinner/midnight snack. I've heard so much about cauliflower rice, I thought I'd go that route — until I realized my grater is functioning at a first grade level (at best), so I just chopped it into little pieces. I DID grate my (purple) sweet potato, though — and that worked out splendidly!

Before I get you to the recipe, let's talk a little bit about cooking technique here. You're gonna take a tortilla and fill it with as much filling as you can while still being able to roll it up. Once it's rolled up, it's going to beg you to unroll it. DON'T DO IT. I, not having tongs, did this: placed the uncooked flauta seam-side-DOWN on a spoon. I held it in place with another spoon as I lowered it down into the pan with the hot hot oil. I slid it off Spoon #1 and held it in place for a few seconds as it settled and the seam cooked itself together. Then, once that side is set and golden, I rolled it over to cook the other side(s). Got it? I've heard of people using toothpicks to hold flautas together, but I'd be afraid they would rip. That, and I don't have any toothpicks. I feel like a darn pioneer over here, making do with whatever I can find in the kitchen! I WILL FIGURE THIS OUT! Whew. Go make some flautas errbody!

Thai Cauliflower and Sweet Potato Flautas with Spicy Peanut Sauce

• Author: by Mary
• Prep Time: 15 mins
• Cook Time: 10 mins
• Total Time: 25 minutes
• Yield: 2-3 1x

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Ingredients

Units USM Scale 1x2x3x

• Sauce
• 1 cup raw peanuts
• 1 cup water
• 1 tsp fish sauce
• 1 tsp brown sugar
• 1 tsp toasted sesame oil
• 2 Tbsp soy sauce
• 1 Tbsp lime juice
• 1 small red Asian chili
• Flautas
• 2 tsp toasted sesame oil
• 1 stalk lemongrass, beaten and VERY finely chopped
• 1 medium head cauliflower, finely chopped (or grated)
• ½ yellow onion, diced
• 2 garlic cloves, minced
• 1 small red Asian chili, minced
• ½ sweet potato, grated
• ½ cup Thai basil
• ¼ cup cilantro, chopped
• salt & pepper
• cooking oil for frying (peanut, if you have it)
• 8 small tortillas (I used flour)

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Instructions

1. First, make the sauce. Combine all the sauce ingredients in a blender and blend until smooth. IF you have time, add another half or full cup of water and bring to a simmer in a saucepan as you prepare the flautas. If not, no worries! You can also just use peanut butter, instead of peanuts, if that's what you have on hand.
2. In a frying pan over medium heat, add the sesame oil and lemongrass. Let cook for a minute or two before adding the cauliflower. Cook for another minute (assuming the cauliflower is very finely chopped, if not — cook it longer! It needs to be softening before you proceed) before adding the onion, garlic, and Asian chili.
3. Cook for one minute before adding the grated sweet potato and half of the Thai basil. Cook for another two minutes before removing from the heat and adding the remaining basil, cilantro, and salt & pepper to taste.
4. In a clean, heavy frying pan, heat ½" of cooking oil over medium heat. Let it heat for at least 3-4 minutes before proceeding. Roll about ⅓ cup of filling in each tortilla to make eight flautas.
5. When the oil is hot, work in batches placing each flauta seam-side-down in the oil. Cook until each side is golden-brown, rolling over to get all sides.
6. Top with extra basil, cilantro, peanuts, and lime. Serve with peanut sauce.

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