I have never been great at rolling stuffed cabbage rolls. In fact, I have always been pretty terrible at it. They tasted great, but the rolling part eluded me. So I watched a few videos and I liked the idea of thinning out the spine with a paring knife. Turns out this made a huge difference. I realized that I didn't make this dish much because I hated making the rolls. But this trick made it much easier and less time consuming. And it looked great on the plate! I used a 50/50 mix of ground beef and pork in this recipe, but feel free to experiment with other proteins. Ground chicken or turkey will work, and you could even skip the meat and go with beans or legumes and make it vegetarian. The only limit is your imagination, and your food plan!
Remove the core of a large cabbage. Remove any wilted leaves from the outside.
Using a pot big enough to hold the cabbage, put 3 cups of water into the pot and then add the whole cabbage.
Bring to a boil on high and then lower and cover. Let cabbage steam for 10 minutes.
Using two large forks, carefully remove the cabbage to a large bowl and let it cool until you can handle it. You still want it somewhat hot to peel off the leaves.
Gently peel off the top 10 leaves or so. Some may rip or tear so we will need a few extra for patches.
Find your best 8 leaves and pat them dry with a paper towel.
Using a sharp paring knife, try to thin out the spine of the leaves. The thinner they are, the easier it is to roll the leaves. If you cut though, we can just patch it with some of the extra leaves we saved.
Mix the ground beef, ground pork, and cooked brown rice together along with all the spices.
Take the leaf and lay it out like a sheet of paper in front of you. Add patches to cover holes or tears.
Take 1/3 cup of the meat and rice mixture and place it on the middle, bottom of the leaf. Use a small fork to shape it into a tube shape. Leave about 1” or so on each side.
Starting at the bottom, begin to roll the leaf up. Stop about half way and fold both sides into the middle and then continue rolling. This should look like an egg roll.
Add ½ cup of tomato sauce to the bottom of an oven safe casserole type dish and lay the cabbage rolls seam side down into the dish.
Roll the other 7 cabbage rolls and add them to the dish.
Pour remaining tomato sauce over all of the cabbage rolls.
Cover and cook in a 350° oven for 1 hour. Remove and let rest covered for 10 minutes before serving.
Serving size is two rolls
This recipe makes 4 servings
Count as: 1 protein - 2 veggies - 1 starch – 1 fat
Servings 0
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