Cauliflowers are the sexiest and most sophisticated of vegetables, so of course there’s a massive one living in the trendy inner-city suburb of Waterloo. The Big Cauliflower lurks above the historic Cauliflower Hotel, where it’s happy flower all the time!
The Hotel dates back to 1862, but the vast veggie isn’t that old. In fact, he looks quite fresh! The original publican, a Mr George Rolfe, built his pub with money he made from selling cauliflowers. He painted one on the side of the building, and the name stuck.
These days the pub is a hip and happenin’ place with an extensive wine selection and mouthwatering modern American food. It’s the sort of place salad-vertising executives love. Nothing, however, overshadows the real star attraction – the Big Cauliflower. He has a good head on him and looks very much like the real deal.
The Big Cauliflower isn’t much of an attention-seeker, and is content to sit up there on the roof, people-watching. It makes it difficult to take a photo with him, but after dodging traffic I was veget-able to grab one! I’ll hang it on my kitchen wall, next to my snaps with the Big Potato and the Big Pumpkin.
Cauliflower Power!
At the conclusion of the photo shoot I swaggered into the pub was and gleefully ordered a cup of their famous cauliflower beer. The barman looked at me as if I’d beamed down from space and told me they didn’t have anything of the sort, and never had.
A couple of tough-looking tradies with cauliflower ears even suggested that my kind weren’t welcome there. Discrimination against those with a penchant for oversized produce is alive and well in Sydney, unfortunately.
Not to be intimidated, I ordered a cup of Resch’s and dunked a generously-proportioned cauliflower in it. The concoction was lumpy, chunky, and smelled like a homeless man’s underwear, but I forced it down. The tradies soon revised their opinion of me, cheering me on as I downed cup after cup of lukewarm cauliflower beer.
I ended up becoming physically ill and was forcefully ejected by a burly security guard, but it was worth it because I wasn’t going to let them think they’d won.
