It was love at first sight in the produce department. I had to stand and stare. Called romanesco, this striking vegetable has the same basic structure as a cauliflower and a similar pattern of florets. However, each romanesco floret is a fractal!
Photographing this beauty meant I could admire the repeating patterns to my heart’s content at a later date – and so can you, dear reader. I cut it up just like I would a cauliflower and adapted the recipe for aloo gobi, Hindi for “potato cauliflower.” Romanesco tastes milder than its cruciferous cousin, providing the perfect canvas for the spice blend that flavors the dish. Time to cook!
Restaurant-style aloo gobi calls for frying the vegetables as the first step. No wonder it’s tasty. To homestyle it, toss parboiled potato chunks and cauliflower (or romanesco) florets in a fraction of the oil and oven-roast until tender, then proceed with a touch more oil for the rest of the recipe.
Feb 19 update: So I gave my low-oil workaround a try. Instead of frying the vegetables to brown them (recipe as written), toss the cauliflower florets and chunked parboiled potatoes with oil (1 tsp per cup of vegetables); roast at 375 F for 20 minutes. As every oven is different, experiment with temperatures and bake times. The goal: slightly browned vegetables. Then follow the rest of the recipe: bloom cumin seeds and asafoetida in 1-2 tablespoons of extra hot oil and continue with the remaining steps.
This update includes an authentic recipe from Nisha Madhulika’s website. When I first published this post, I linked to a New York Times recipe. Two experiments to try. 🙂 Enjoy!
P.S.
Check out these older posts on fractals in nature:
Feelin’ Fibonacci
Birth of a fractal
What a Wonderful World! 
👍🏽
Thanks for reading!