Cabbage Rolls - leaf stripping?

[ChrisGreaves]

I can't say that my first effort at cabbage rolls is successful.
Obtaining leaves from the cabbage turned out to be the greatest disaster in my life since trying to hook the Canon 3200F scanner up to a win7-64-bit system.

The recipe said "Strip a dozen leaves from the cabbage", then boil, cool them etc.

I had a purple cabbage, nice enough in salads when shredded.
I got the first leaf off OK.
The second leaf came off only by dividing into two parts.
The remaining leaves, having been alerted to the danger, seemed to crinkle themselves, arms folded, nay, locked in mutual distrust of the pot of boiling water, boiling dry as time passed by.

How do you convince cabbage leaves to come away in one chunk?

I generally attack cabbages by lopping off a large chunk with a larger knife and throwing it (the chunk) into a shredder.
I suspect this is the first time I've tried to obtain individual leaves.

[Hey Jude]

The "stripping" caught my eye :-) Well, when I need cabbage leaves, I suppose it's counter-intuitive, but I rinse my cabbage head, take the center out and toss it in a ziploc baggie (usually gallon size). When I need the leaves for my cabbage rolls, or stuffing them with whatever I have handy, I take it out of the freezer and the leaves come right off nicely. I don't remember having to convince the cabbage. I've only done this with the green as opposed to purple since the purple variety is usually much smaller and it leaves me with inferior-sized leaves. What are you putting in these cabbage rolls--since that is part of the subject?

[HansV]

You should boil the cabbage to make the leaves easier to remove.
See How to Prepare Cabbage Rolls and many others.

[Hey Jude]

I just Googled it and found that Martha Stewart does this:

1. Core the cabbage.
2. Boil the cabbage for about two or three minutes.
3. Remove the outer leaves and then return it to a boil.
4. Repeat until you've removed all the leaves you need.

[ChrisGreaves]

The "stripping" caught my eye :-)

Why am I surprised?

... I take it out of the freezer

You freeze the sucker? Presumably such a (frozen) cabbage is good only for soft leaves; that is, it'd not shred up nicely for a salad after it had been frozen and thawed?

... the green as opposed to purple

Silly me. I saw a purple cabbage in my fridge and used it. I think you have stumbled onto something here. last time I saw a green cabbage its leaves were smooth. My purple cabbage leaves are convoluted like a cat's brain.

What are you putting in these cabbage rolls--since that is part of the subject?

A modified version of this (below, colored purple in honor of the dead cabbage). I had ground pork instead of ground beef, powdered milk instead of Real Milk, etc. I suspect the filling is basically ground meet, onion, rice. Anything else is a whim.
I didn't post the recipe because I was interested in the method of the leaves.

Now that I have a half-ton of purple cabbage, I'll eat purple-cabbage salad for the rest of the week and turn the filling into sausage rolls or patties or something else.

Cabbage Rolls are made with cabbage leaves filled with ground beef and rice, with tomato sauce.
Ingredients:
* 12 cabbage leaves
Filling:
* 1 pound ground beef
* 3/4 cup cooked rice
* 1/2 cup finely chopped onion
* 1 egg
* 2 teaspoons salt
* 1 teaspoon pepper
* 1/2 cup milk
Sauce:
* 1 cans (8 ounces ) tomato sauce
* 1 can (14.5 ounces) diced tomatoes, undrained
* 3 tablespoons sugar
* 2 tablespoons vinegar
* 1/2 cup water
* 2 tablespoons cornstarch mixed with 1/4 cup cold water
Preparation:
Drop cabbage leaves into boiling salted water; cover and cook for 3 minutes. Drain well. For filling, combine ground beef, rice, onion, egg, and salt, pepper, and milk.
Mix well and divide into 12 portions. Place a portion into the center of each cabbage leaf. Roll leaf around filling; fasten with toothpick. Place in a baking dish. For sauce, combine tomato sauce, tomatoes, sugar, vinegar, and 1/2 cup of water and pour over cabbage rolls. Bake covered in a preheated 350° oven 40 to 45 minutes. Remove rolls and discard toothpicks. Place pan with juices over medium heat or transfer the juices to a saucepan and place over heat; stir cornstarch and water mixture into the sauce; bring to a boil and cook until thickened.
Recipe for cabbage rolls serves 6.

[ChrisGreaves]

You should boil the cabbage to make the leaves easier to remove.
See How to Prepare Cabbage Rolls and many others.

2. Place cabbage, bottom down in 12 qt. cooking vessel with water covering 1/2 to 3/4 of the cabbage head.
3. Bring to boil and simmer until cabbage leaves are easily removed and leaves are only slightly withered on the ends and the thick end of the leaves are just tender enough for folding.

Hans, where were you when I needed you at 3pm this afternoon ???

[ChrisGreaves]

2. Boil the cabbage for about two or three minutes.
3. Remove the outer leaves and then return it to a boil.

Thanks HeyJude.
If it's good enough for Martha Stewart its good enough for me.
Next time you're chatting with her, ask her what to do with the 67-4=63 cooked leaves she doesn't need right now if she's making only 4 cabbage rolls, it having been ascertained that cats don't like cabbage rolls.
It seems to me that any mention of boiling (or in your case freezing) a cabbage means that one ends up either with an awful lot of boiled cabbage or an awful lot of cabbage rolls.

[ChrisGreaves]

What are you putting in these cabbage rolls

I just thought of a better answer: Toothpicks!

HPIM3581 [640x480].JPG

These two were left over.
I must admit to some hesitancy in eating the leaves. For one thing the water I boiled them in turned the colour of woad, with strange genetic memories of my past ... or at least of a Boy Scout campfire circa 1958.

The mixture turned out OK. It seemed a bit sloppy after the egg went in, so I threw in a handful of uncooked rice, which seemed to cook quite nicely, thank you, and absorbed what I feared would be slop ("woad be slop"?)

I couldn't wrap both ends of some rolls, because the leaves had split in two and were too small.
So I stood those rolls on end, the sealed end down, and the open end to the top.
The lot were baked in a covered casserole dish from Corning NY, in a 350F oven until I'd finished answering my correspondent's question about vermicomposting, which took longer than I thought it would take, but turned out to be just right.

I realise now that I could have built the rolls in several phases:
Phase 1: Make a cylinder, a sausage if you will, rolling the filling into a large cabbage leaf.
Phase 2: Cap each end with a smaller chunk of leaf.

[Hey Jude]

I'll be sure to give Martha your regards....just don't use skunk cabbage ok?????? That I NEVER allow in my house, much less my freezer!

I call "covered dish from Corning NY" a Corning casserole (qt, 2 qt, 3 qt, 5 qt) etc. I have alot of those including a 3 qt crockpot that is wonderful with the Corning insert, but I digress.

The color of the water is to be expected and if I recall correctly, Cabbage is packed full of Vitamin C so alot of your nutrients end up in the H20 getting tossed--I always drank the fluids from the veggies...one of my idiosyncrasies. I'd throw some of the excess leaves into the blender along with parsley, comfrey, dandelion, spinach and make a great "green drink" which was my energizer in those days of raising teenagers......

When I made my cabbage rolls (we called them "egg rolls") I would make tons of them and what we didn't eat, we froze in nifty ziploc baggies so when we wanted apéritif(s) or snacks we would pop them in the micro for a minor nuking. I rarely have bought any cabbage from the grocer but instead bought from local farm stands (organically grown ONLY). Formerly we raised our own extensive garden with 10-12" cabbage heads (green) and about 8" diameter purple heads. I used to steam the heads to pull the leaves off--worked nicely--but there was a friend who we used to go back and forth with our kids and she swore by freezing, so I tried it and I liked it. The end result is basically the same so as per the norm, it's up to YOU.

Those look good, and I would have eaten them....Good Job!!

[Hey Jude]

I make them along the same lines as filling and wrapping enchiladas or fajitas; put the ingredients inside, start rolling and folding in the sides so it's all neat and tidily wrapped.

[BobH]

Here you go, Chris!

Bile 'Em Cabbage Down

Bile Them Cabbage Down

Bile them cabbage down, down
turn them hoe-cakes round, round
The only song that I can sing
is bile them cabbage down

Took my gal to the blacksmith shop
to have her mouth made small
She turned around a time or two
and swallowed shop and all

Went up on the mountain
gave my horn a blow
Thought I heard my true love say
yonder comes my beau

Went to see my gal last night
thought I'd do it sneakin'
Missed her mouth and hit her nose
and the doggone thing was leakin'

Raccoon in a simmon tree
possum on the ground
Raccoon said, you son of a gun
shake some simmons down

Once I had an old gray mule
his name was Simon Slick
He'd roll his eyes and back his ears
and how that mule would kick

How that mule would kick
he kicked with his dying breath
He shoved his hind feet down his throat
and kicked himself to death

[ChrisGreaves]

Here you go, Chris!Bile 'Em Cabbage Down

Good One, Bob!
(What's the medallion on the front of your hat?)

[ChrisGreaves]

I make them along the same lines as filling and wrapping enchiladas or fajitas;

You're way ahead of me.

put the ingredients inside, start rolling and folding in the sides so it's all neat and tidily wrapped.

Therein lay my problem; parts of my cabbage leaves were too thick/tough to fold over properly.
I'm going to try again with a green cabbage.
Once I've eaten this purple cabbage.

[ChrisGreaves]

I'd throw some of the excess leaves into the blender along with

I keep my stalks & stumps in a bag and once a week boil/puree them into the soup pot.

we froze in nifty ziploc baggies so when we wanted apéritif(s) or snacks

Ah! So I freeze the excess.
That's good news for me; I tend to do a Big Cook on the weekend and draw on it over the week. Making 36 cabbage rolls (or whatever I get from a cabbage) means a single mess and then a stream of snacks for visitors etc.

Those look good, and I would have eaten them....Good Job!!

Thanks for the condiments.
If you were here I'd have fed them to you!
Along with my ginger-orange cookies.

[HansV]

Along with my ginger-orange cookies.

Huh? You've converted Jupiter into cookies?

[ChrisGreaves]

Along with my ginger-orange cookies.

Huh? You've converted Jupiter into cookies?

Don't tempt me to elaborate :stern:

[Hey Jude]

If you were here I'd have fed them to you!
Along with my ginger-orange cookies.

I'd be interested in your method of inserting the fortunes You neglected to comment on what my fortune would have been

[Hey Jude]

Fortunate cookie tips

Sounds like you have toooo much time on your hands so here's another "must" to occupy yourself

[ChrisGreaves]

... comment on what my fortune would have been

"Fate", surely?

[Hey Jude]

Surely I fated better than the tweet-tweet!