Sweet and sour cauliflower tastes just like sweet and sour chicken but without the meat!
One of the best comfort foods is take out Chinese. My favorite Chinese food is sweet and sour chicken but it is so bad for you! I have made a lot of baked sweet and sour chicken recipes before and they are always a hit. Making baked sweet and sour chicken is obviously healthier than from a restaurant but I had the idea of making it with cauliflower to cut down on the calories and it was a HUGE success!
The key to making the cauliflower have the deep fried flavor and texture without actually deep frying it is to coat it in eggs, then coat in corn starch, then coat in egg again and cook in a little bit of olive oil until crispy. This gives the cauliflower an amazing breading that makes it taste like take out!
The sweet and sour sauce has sugar and ketchup for sweetness and vinegar for sourness. There is also a little soy sauce and garlic powder to add flavor. This sauce thickens up on its own from the corn starch on the cauliflower so none is added directly to the sauce.
Toss this cauliflower with some rice and this recipe will be your new go-to Chinese dish!
- 1 large head of cauliflower, cut into bite sized pieces
- 4 large eggs, slightly beaten
- 1 cup corn starch
- ¼ cup olive oil
- 1 cup sugar
- ⅓ cup ketchup
- ¼ cup vinegar
- ¼ cup cider vinegar
- 2 tablespoons soy sauce
- ½ teaspoon garlic powder
- Rice for serving (optional)
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Spray a 13x9 pan with non-stick cooking spray.
- Heat a large skillet over medium high heat. Coat the cauliflower chunks in egg, then corn starch, and then egg again. Cook in batches in the skilled with 1 tablespoon of olive oil per batch. Allow the egg to brown slightly on all sides of the cauliflower.
- Once the edges of the cauliflower are browned, move into the prepared 13x9 pan. (Note: the cauliflower will not be cooked through at this point) Repeat until all the cauliflower is coated and browned.
- In a small bowl, whisk the sugar, ketchup, vinegar, cider vinegar, soy sauce, and garlic powder. Pour evenly over the cauliflower.
- Bake the cauliflower uncovered for 1 hour, stirring every 15 minutes. Serve immediately with rice if desired.
Need more recipes? Check out some of my favorites!
Pesto Sun Dried Tomato Grilled Cheese Sandwich
Chicken Caesar Salad Waffle Sandwich 
What a cool concept! I love this recipe. It’s definitely healthier than all of that fried chicken.
I agree! And just as yummy!