Oh where to start. This was supposed to be a straightforward Tuesday night dinner – blanch a few cabbage leaves, make a bit of stuffing, roll them up and pop them in the oven.
All I can say is that the air was blue in my kitchen (if you don’t use that expression it means I swore a lot).
First I removed the central stalk and blanched the leaves as instructed. Then I made some seasonal stuffing, then I tried to put some stuffing onto a cabbage leaf and roll it into a neat parcel and that’s where it all went wrong. Did the person that wrote this recipe have some sort of gigantic cabbage leaves or something? Or were their cranberries not round and so didn’t ping out the minute you started trying to roll the things? Or did the big split up the middle not cause them a few problems when trying to keep all the stuffing inside? I’ll stop cause I’m getting angry just thinking about it.
Do not be put off by my bad experience – these are divine!!! A few tips… don’t bother your head taking out the stalk; 6 cabbage leaves is not enough to use up all the stuffing so blanch a few more leaves than this; don’t panic if your stuffed cabbage leaves look like crap they will be fine when they come out of the oven (see pic); and it helps if you stick a cocktail stick through each one to hold it together (good idea Jono).
We had just these for dinner and I cannot do justice to how tasty they were. Chestnuts, wild rice, cranberries, rosemary, balsamic, honey and a few other goodies. The leftovers are going to be used for a side dish tomorrow night. This is a great recipe and if you follow the advice above hopefully you won’t lose your temper while making. If you do lose your temper I promise you’ll feel better when you taste them.
Find the recipe here:
http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/8018/braised-stuffed-cabbage
Julie
Jono & Jules do food & wine 
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