The LHC May Not Be Working But I'm Still Doing Experiments

Today I performed an experiment. The hypothesis: "I can make cabbage taste good". It was considered a high risk, high payoff experiment. High risk because I have only had success making cabbage based salads in the past, and high pay off because this difficult vegetable has dominated our CSA box in recent weeks. Success would save us from culinary frustration and boredom. Reading through the literature I found that potentially tasty cabbage had been obtained in a stuffed and rolled state. So off to the kitchen I went with two different fillings in mind. I decided that creating two fillings rather than just one was prudent because a) I had a big cabbage and b) in the event of failure of one stuffing the other could still potentially succeed. I'm happy to say after two hours of work our hypothesis was validated for both stuffing states and a pleasing cabbage based meal was produced. What follows is not so much a recipe as a general description of the method followed by a vague description of the stuffings.

Stuffed Cabbage:

Not the most beautiful looking, but certainly yummy!

1 head of cabbage

Bring a large pot of water big enough to submerge the cabbage to boil. Remove any outer leaves that are discolored or wilted. Cut around the core in square with deep incisions but don't actually try to remove it.

Submerge the cabbage in the boiling water for 4-5 minutes and then carefully remove. Peel off the 3 or so layers which now are supple and then repeat the submerging process until you've removed as many leaves as you want. You can use the rest of the cabbage in a salad or in your stuffing.

Lay the removed leaves on the counter and let cool. Cut out the tough triangular region at the bottom of the leaf, but don't cut off too much because you need room for the filling.

When you are ready to make the rolls, preheat the oven to 375 F and get a glass baking dish ready. Open a cabbage leaf, put a small french-sized ice cream scoop size of filling in the middle and then roll the leave up tightly up as you would a burrito or egg roll or other wrapped food of your choice. Put the rolled cabbages in the baking dish, add a 1/4 cup of liquid of your choice and cover tightly with foil. Bake for 30 min and serve either plane or with a sauce of some sort.

Filling #1
This concoction was a middle eastern side of the Mediterranean inspired stuffing. I cooked bulgur and french lentils in vegetable stock then added olive oil and grated carrot. I also sauteed onions and then added chopped mushrooms which i'd pulsed in a food processor until they were minced. These were cooked until the liquid mostly evaporated and then added to the bulgur mixture. It was topped off with a generous sprinkling of Ras-al-Hanout(one of my favorite spice blends), some chopped preserved lemon, and a handful of chopped dried apricots.

Filling #2
The second filling was inspired by the greek side of the Mediterranean and what was available in my fridge. I cooked brown rice, then added chopped fresh parsley and marjoram, a handful of chopped marinated artichoke hearts, some more preserved lemon and a spoonful or two of Trader Joe's sundried tomato bruschetta. Some small chunks of feta and mozzarella were enough to make the filling substantial. And delicious.

When I baked both I added the juice of 1 lemon to the water since almost everything I cook these days has to contain some part of a fresh lemon.

The stuffed cabbages were a fun and different meal for us to have, but it was definitely a weekend production. It could get a lot easier if you had some pre-cooked rice or other filling and just went with simple stuffing ingredients like nuts and raisins or cheese. I froze half of the batch and am curious to see how they survive the freezer stay.