I’m making stuffed cabbage for dinner. My recipe historically is pretty simple: ground meat, rice, and garlic rolled into cabbage leaves and braised slowly in a tomato-y chicken broth.
I want to goose it up. What else can I mix in with the filling to make it more interesting? And ditto for the sauce. So far it’s just chicken broth, canned tomatoes, a little onion and bay leaves. I want to make it more lively.
Any tips?
The Hungarian version also uses sauerkraut in the “sauce” portion of the stuffed rolls:
I’ve usually made it pretty simply like you, though with onions instead of garlic. The Polish version is usually served with a tomato sauce, but you can also make mushroom sauce with it, or a creamy tomato sauce that has sour cream in it as well. I personally like it better with savoy cabbage than regular white cabbage. Also, you can use other grains instead of rice. My mother sometimes uses barley or buckwheat (our Christmas Eve stuffed cabbage is a mix of mushrooms and buckwheat.)
Add Caraway seeds to the mixture? I tend to do that when cabbage is involved.
Long sliced Carrots tucked around when tomato sauce added on top.
My mom used a can of tomato soup thinned with water.
I do this as well. Also chopped onions or peppers in with the meat. Hot sauce on the table for those who want it.
A bit of vinegar and sugar in the sauce is the way I always had it growing up (Jewish style). Last Rosh Hashanah, Costco carried a brand that was made this way.
I could use a basic recipe. I see cabbages dirt cheap at the grocery store and often find myself wondering what else I can do with them besides potentially make kimchi, which is too much for most of my family to eat.
My cousin made a ‘stuffed cabbage casserole’ with some kind of sausage instead of hamburger, wish I could remember what kind.
And the Romanian version of the dish uses sauerkraut leaves to roll the filling in, but that tends to be a bit difficult to come. I know I’ve seen it in some Eastern European markets, but I don’t think they are commonly available.
I’m constantly making coleslaw when the farm by us has cabbages, to the point where my gf becomes concerned. There are just so many different ways to make it! I’ll reach a point where I eat coleslaw for lunch, with dinner, as a snack.
I don’t do stuffed cabbage, but I have one quick and dirty side dish recipe that uses green or red cabbage, carrots, green onions and vinegar in a sautee and another that uses red cabbage, one or two tart crisp apples, onion, allspice and balsamic vinegar if you are interested in those. I make the latter ahead of time and refrigerate overnight to let the flavors meld.
I also add some raisins.
We put cabbage in our haluski. I also put some in our Colcannon, although I’ve been told that’s not kosher.
ETA: if you make roasted root vegetables (turnips, beets, onions, carrots, parsnips, swedes, potatoes) add a wedge or three of cabbage.
Yeah, my folks sometimes change up the meat depending on what leftovers they want to use up. They have a meat grinder, so my dad will grind up leftover ham or Canadian bacon or whatever smoked meat they have and mix it in with the ground pork or use it just on its own. I wouldn’t be surprised if they used some kind of smoked sausage in the past, but I’m not sure they’ve ever used a fresh sausage, but why not?
Me, too! I was just going to post it! Probably too late for Kayaker for the batch he is working on now, but using wild rice instead of white or brown lends a nice texture and a little crunch.
My recipe:
I make lots and freeze the leftovers. I can get 4 meals out of one batch. I tweak the recipe by adding more pepper flake, but it’s a pretty good “I’m not going to do all that work” dish.
I’m not Jewish, but this is how my Hungarian grandmother made it. That little bit of sugar (I usually used brown) brings all the flavors together.
I think cabbage in any English/Scots/Irish recipe is perfectly fine. Potatoes and cabbage are like peas n’ carrots :). Rumbledethumps uses them both, for example.
Huh - I’ve never had colcannon without cabbage in it.
My recipe uses kale.
Yeah, I think I’ve only had it with cabbage, though I’ve heard of kale or some other leafy green like chard being used.