Braised cabbage - general principles and methods of cooking
From this seemingly simple and inexpensive vegetable you can cook truly royal dishes. Braised cabbage is one of them. Varying with spices and additional ingredients, sometimes you get real culinary masterpieces - tasty, nourishing, aromatic. You can put out cabbage modestly on water, with a little oil, or you can put meat, mushrooms, raisins, prunes, tomato paste, beans and other vegetables. In any case, get tasty. Try and choose the most favorite recipe.
Braised Cabbage - Food Preparation
You can stew both fresh cabbage and sauerkraut. Fresh must be washed under water, cleaned from the upper hard leaves, they usually have a greenish color. Then, if it is a whole head of cabbage, it must be cut into quarters and then finely chopped into strips. The stump must be removed.
If sauerkraut, it is sorted, large pieces finely chopped. If it is very acidic, you can rinse it in water. But along with the water from the cabbage will leave a large amount of vitamin C. Therefore, it is still better to take cabbage of optimal sourness so that it does not have to be soaked and washed. Balance the level of acid will help a teaspoon of sugar, added to the pan, where the dish is prepared.
Braised Cabbage - Best Recipes
Recipe 1: Braised Cabbage
A very simple recipe, even beginner housewives can make it. The amount of cabbage should be taken based on the volume of the cauldron, where it will be stewed and the number of eaters. On average, you can take one small head or half of a large one, by weight it goes 1-1.5 kg. Even if it seems that the chopped cabbage is too much, during the quenching, it will pour out the juice and settle, i.e. will decrease in volume. Cabbage is better to take late varieties, i.e. autumn harvest. In addition to salt and pepper, you can add dried dill, parsley and bay leaves to taste. Some like more fresh cabbage, then it should be stewed without adding tomato paste. Ingredients: head of cabbage, 2-3 medium onions, 50-70g tomato paste, frying oil, pepper and salt.
Method of preparation
Cabbage chop medium-sized straws, onions - half-rings. In a cauldron with hot oil, fry the onion, then the tomato paste and add the cabbage. Fry it a little, mixing it with tomato and onion, add one and a half cups of hot water. When the mass boils, lower the heat and simmer the cabbage to softness. It takes 30-40 minutes. For about ten minutes until the end of stewing, cabbage pepper and salt.
Recipe 2: Braised Cabbage with Sausage
Meat is not always on hand, but a piece of boiled sausage or a pair of sausages in a fridge sausage will be found. They can be combined with cabbage and quickly cooked inexpensive, but tasty and hearty dinner.
Ingredients: cabbage, 2 large onions, 1 carrot, 100g of tomato paste, boiled sausage (sausages, small sausages) - 300g, pepper, salt, bay leaf, vegetable oil.
Method of preparation
Fry the onion slices chopped onion in a cauldron, add grated carrots, and after two minutes thinly chopped cabbage. Stir the ingredients and simmer until soft, adding a glass of boiling water. Vegetables are stewed on low heat with the lid closed.
Chop sausage or sausages randomly, fry to the crust and add to the cauldron with cabbage. In that oil, where the sausage was fried, fry the tomato paste for a minute and add to the vegetables. Put all the spices and salt, mix and stew all together for another five to seven minutes.
The second way of stewing cabbage with sausages is more dietary and quick to prepare. You will need: the same cabbage, 2 small carrots, sausages, 3 tablespoons of olive oil (olive oil), greens and salt.
Pour oil into a frying pan or cast-iron cauldron, pour grated carrots and cabbage shredded with a fine straw. Cover and cook over high heat. It is necessary to ensure that vegetables do not stick, for this they are periodically mixed. When the cabbage is reddened, reduce the fire, pour in half a glass of boiling water, chopped sausages, salt and simmer for ten minutes. Sprinkle fresh cabbage with fresh herbs - dill, parsley, etc.
Recipe 3: Chicken Braised
The dish is prepared fairly quickly, so it is quite possible to have time to prepare it for the arrival of the husband from work. Cabbage comes out very juicy and tender, and in combination with chicken meat it turns out to be perfect. This recipe without adding onions, but those who do not represent cooking meat and cabbage without onions, can of course add it. In this case, it is pre-fried before adding meat. If you want to put whole pieces of chicken, before you add the cabbage, you need to bring them to half-cooked - well fry or stew.
Ingredients: cabbage 1-1.5 kg, 0.5 kg of chicken (breast, fillet or a couple of chicken legs), a couple of spoons of tomato paste, salt, pepper, vegetable oil.
Method of preparation
Meat cut into large pieces. If it is a chicken leg, then the meat must be cut from it, separated from the bones. For cooking, you can take the pan, cauldron or thick-walled dishes. Put the meat in it and fry for about four minutes so that it turns white from all sides.
Add chopped cabbage into thin strips, mix and fry under cover for 20 minutes. If the cabbage will burn, you can pour a little water from the kettle. Pepper, salt, add tomato paste and mix. Leave the stew for another 20 minutes to make the cabbage very soft. With mashed potatoes, mashed potatoes or just boiled potatoes are well combined.
Recipe 4: Braised Cabbage with Prunes
Delicious braised cabbage with the aroma of smoke. Prune gives savory taste to the dish. If it is dry, it should be steamed for 10 minutes, i.e. pour boiling water. To taste was more savory, and the flavor is richer, you need to buy smoked prunes. If you want the dish to be lean, the meat from the recipe can be excluded.
Ingredients: cabbage - 1-1,5kg, 200-300g of chicken breast or fillet, one carrot, one onion, 150g of smoked pitted prunes (1 cup), tomato paste 2-3 tablespoons, salt- pepper to taste, a couple of leaves of Lavrushka and vegetable oil. Method of preparation
Cut the meat into cubes and fry it. Then add alternately, gradually frying, onion half rings, grated carrots, chopped cabbage into small straws. Pour in about a glass of boiling water and simmer for 15 minutes at medium heat. Open the lid and add the tomato paste and prunes. Pour another cup of boiling water over, stir, put bay leaves, salt and pepper. Cover and simmer for 15 minutes until cooked.
Recipe 5: Sauerkraut Stew
The sour taste of sauteed cabbage stew in perfect harmony with any meat, so it is considered a traditional side dish to many meat dishes. This recipe is borrowed from Latvian cuisine. Cabbage turns out very tasty. And the secret is simple - you need a lot of carrots. And she always rubs on a fine grater. You can, of course, and large rub, but in the original it is fine.
Ingredients: 1 kilogram of sauerkraut, 0.6 kg of carrots, 3 onions, vegetable oil or fat (either pork, chicken), one or two teaspoons of cumin.
Method of preparation
Chop the onion finely and lightly fry, add the grated carrots and sweat a little together. Then put sauerkraut and fill with water - approximately at the level of the cabbage layer. Leave to stew until ready.
After about half an hour, add the cumin and continue to simmer until soft. Especially tasty cabbage is obtained, cooked in pig fat.
Recipe 6: Braised Kale with Mushrooms
Cabbage with mushrooms has an amazing taste. It is cooked in the oven, but before that the vegetables are fried on a stove in a frying pan. The process of quenching takes from 40 minutes to one hour. The time depends on the hardness of the cabbage and the temperature in the oven. At the exit, the cabbage gets a beautiful light brown shade and just melts in your mouth.
Ingredients: 1.5 kg of fresh cabbage, 0.5 kg of carrots, 4 large onions, half a kilogram of any fresh mushrooms, tomato paste - 100 g, to taste with salt and spices.
Method of preparation:
Cut cabbage into quarters and chop into thin strips. Pour several spoons of butter into the pan, heat it and fry the cabbage. The whole cabbage is unlikely to fit. Therefore, you need to fry in batches and shift to the cauldron. Fry until it freezes and decreases in volume. It is not necessary to pour a lot of oil, so that the cabbage is only slightly wetted by it. Onion cut into half rings or small cubes and fry. Add carrots and stew until soft - you can pour a little water. Transfer to the cauldron.
Mushrooms arbitrarily chop and put on an almost dry frying pan. As they empty the juice, it is necessary to drain it into the cauldron, and add butter and fry to the pan to the mushrooms. They, too, to shift to the pot. The contents of the cauldron must be salted, mixed, add tomato paste (you can dilute it slightly with water), a couple of glasses of boiling water and place in the oven (180-200C). Simmer with the lid open until tender.
Periodically in the pot should look in and be interested in the state of the cabbage. If the water boils away, you can pour it little by little. 15 minutes before the end of quenching add a few bay leaves and salt.
Braised Cabbage - useful tips from experienced chefs
The density and peculiar taste of braised cabbage will be given by a tablespoon of ordinary wheat flour. It is necessary to dry it in a dry frying pan to a cream color and add it to the cauldron five minutes before it is ready.
Fans of sweet and sour taste can add to the cabbage five to ten minutes before the end of its stewing, a spoonful of vinegar and sugar.
If you like cabbage, but do not tolerate its peculiar smell when cooking, put a slice of stale bread in the pan. At the end of cooking, soften the bread, remove with a slotted spoon.
