In the kitchen with Lee Miller

Cauliflowerbreasts Recipe

Article

No. 23 • September 2021

After her time as a model for Vogue, muse to many surrealists and a photographer at the front, Lee Miller (1907–1977) sought refuge in the kitchen.

text: Sarah Knigge

It’s almost impossible to imagine that Lee Miller lived just one life. Perhaps it was for the best that the dazzling girl from Poughkeepsie had no idea what lay ahead when she arrived in New York in 1927. Flash forward: she would be nearly run over, only to be saved in the nick of time by Condé Nast, the founder of Vogue, and would soon appear on the cover of the magazine. She would move to Paris, become Man Ray’s assistant and lover, and blossom into a surrealist photographer in her own right. She would dance with Charlie Chaplin, pose for Picasso, and act in a film by Jean Cocteau. She would travel across Europe as a war correspondent, publish her photographs of the Dachau concentration camp in Vogue under the headline ‘Believe it’, and take a bath in Hitler’s abandoned apartment. She would move to Cairo with her Egyptian husband, leave him, and later marry the artist Roland Penrose, with whom she would have a child and settle in the English countryside—a place where she hoped to leave the past behind.

It was here, at Farley Farm in East Sussex, that she managed to reinvent herself one final time. Haunted by traumas from her youth and the war, she put photography aside—her prints vanished into the basement—and found refuge in the kitchen. “Cooking is pure therapy,” she confessed. She would spend late nights poring over her favourite cookbooks—she owned around two thousand of them—and hosted legendary dinners with “dishes that are surrealist surprises”, such as her famous Cauliflower Breasts. Despite all that, Picasso’s favourite remained a traditional classic: “Theee Eeeenglish Chreeestmas Puuuding.”

Cauliflowerbreasts Recipe

2 cauliflowers
1 large egg
350 ml vegetable oil
1 tbsp tomato purée
1 tsp salt
White pepper (to taste)
1 hard-boiled egg
Caviar or tapenade
Finely chopped parsley
Tomato, diced into small cubes

Cut the cauliflowers into florets and cook them in a pan of water until tender. Rinse the florets under cold water, drain well, divide between two round bowls, and press them down firmly. Pour off any excess liquid.

To make the mayonnaise, use a blender. Crack the egg (using the whole egg rather than just the yolk, to give the mayonnaise a lighter colour) into the bowl and start blending. Slowly pour in the oil, then add the tomato purée for a pink tint. Season with salt and white pepper to taste.

Pour a little of the mayonnaise over the cauliflower before placing them on a serving plate. Turn out the bowls of cauliflower onto the plate and place them side by side. Use the remaining mayonnaise, slices of hard-boiled egg, caviar or tapenade, chopped parsley, and diced tomato for garnish.