Cabbage wins. It's an excellent storage crop for both you and the farm, and has the useful character traits of being delicious both raw and cooked. Shredded finely, it's an excellent salad base that can lean tangy and fresh or savory and sweet, maybe with a miso-maple dressing or lime-spiked mayonnaise. Lately, I've been sure to keep a head of green cabbage on hand, and when I don't feel like cooking, I make the quickest cabbage-only slaw (get a mandoline, y'all) with a miso dressing that's blended in my magic bullet. This salad is so addicting, and my husband and I can eat an entire head of cabbage, easily, in a sitting. The dressing is similar in flexibility to the one featured in the potato-crouton cabbage recipe below.
Growing up, my dad would finely shred a head of cabbage, and then dress it with a jar of olive-packed muffuletta mix and some big spoonfuls of mayo. This is an excellent way to make a savory, filling, slaw of sorts. If you roughly chop your cabbage but still want to eat it raw, massage it with a bit of olive oil and salt like this recipe suggests. I recently made this "Raw and Roasted Cabbage Salad" recipe for a baby shower, and because I'm either cooking for 2 or 200, I had a lot of leftovers. On day 3, the slaw got thrown in a hot wok, and mixed with noodles, sesame, and soy. On day 4, the slaw was thrown in a well-oiled skillet and then topped with some scrambled eggs for a riff on okonomiyaki. Cabbage can do all this.
Cabbage is also excellent hot. When I was around 22 years old, I lived in Jerusalem. On one Shabbat dinner, a school friend of mine, Emily, sliced some green cabbage into thick ribbons, threw it under the broiler with olive oil and salt, and then squeezed some lemon juice over the scorched brassica. We were young, and such an elegantly edited recipe seemed revolutionary at the time. I still follow Emily on Instagram (her kids are very cute), but we haven't spoken in 10+ years. But I still remember (and often replicate) her cabbage. Cabbage can do that... burn its way into your sensory memory bank with just the right mitzvah of salt and heat. Cabbage is also delicious when slowly braised, those winter sugars caramelizing into a sweet mess of comfort delicious on its own, or spooned over rice. I've got an inordinate number of saved cabbage recipes on my Instagram account.
Here are 5 to get you drooling... I mean cooking.
1. Cacio E Pepe Cabbage Chips.
Carla Lalli Music made chips with cabbage. Brilliant! "Verified
Regular old cabbage went to Rome and had an Eat, Pray, Love experience and came back as crispy cacio e pepe chips. So crunchy and savory and easy! And vegetarian! This is a new unpublished recipe that I had fun developing!" See post here.
2. Potato-Crouton Brassica Slaw with Miso Dressing
Do you follow Baked by Melissa on Instagram? This account is a constant source of easy, veg-related inspiration. This recipe is technically made with shaved Brussels sprouts but would be equally delicious with cabbage. See post here.
3. Chinese Stuffed Cabbage Rolls
Chinese New Year is January 22nd, and these stuffed cabbage rolls seem like a wonderful nod to the Year of the Rabbit. These are made with Nappa cabbage, but green cabbage could work equally well. Quickly blanch whole cabbage leaves to make them more pliable.
See post here.
4. Melted Cabbage
This melted cabbage recipe is the sole reason I bought Adeen Sussman's Sababa cookbook. (Cookbook and cabbage are equally recommended.)
5. Cabbage Man
Okay, technically this isn't a recipe. But I just want you to see this man with matching purple-cabbage fleece. "What even is joy, if not a grandpa dressed as a giant cabbage?" See post here.
