Try new ways to enjoy cabbage

Our insurance sent us some helpful nutrition hints, and this one caught my eye: eat one serving of a cruciferous vegetable each day for good heart health. Well, we all want that, so I read further. Broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage and brussels sprouts are the main ones that are readily available and affordable (along with a few others you can see here). That means some repetition. So, it’s time to dig into my favorite, and try new ways to enjoy cabbage.

We took a short trip to FL recently and a friend we would be visiting admitted she needed to change her eating habits and had been considering cabbage steaks. She’s not a huge fan of anything green so this was WAY outside her comfort zone. But it was the perfect thing to experiment with while we were together and turned out to be loads of fun. Here’s what we tried.

Cabbage Steaks 

She found several YouTube videos that looked interesting. We finally decided on this one from eatsomethingvegan.com (here’s the video and here’s the recipe). It looked SO good we just had to give it a go.

How thick should your cabbage steaks be?

Eatsomethingvegan suggested ¾-1” thick steaks but we found that took a good while to cook. I’d suggest going thinner if you can manage it, then watch closely while cooking so they don’t burn.

Which way should you cut your cabbage steaks?

While thoroughly roasting these should make the core soft as well, I find it’s still pretty bitter no matter what you’ve put on it. I tried the horizontal way – cutting away one small slice on one side, then cutting the slices with cabbage sitting on that flat part – and the first couple of slices were pretty much all core.

I also tried vertically – cutting off the hard dry part of the stem, and then cutting the slices with the cabbage sitting upright on that flat spot. As you can see in the picture, there’s a slice that has the majority of the core in it, but even if you ended up cutting that away, there’s still a lot to eat on that piece.

3 variations of cabbage steaks

We did the olive oil, salt, garlic, and paprika (we used smoked) as suggested above but felt it needed more foundation to the flavor. So, we moved to melted butter…BIG difference…and I even liked it better as leftovers!

Then we also tried an Asian variation based on this recipe.

We simply used the olive oil (could have used sesame oil probably), then added the sauce ingredients of apple cider vinegar, sugar and soy sauce. It was quite tasty but of course wasn’t Whole30. So, I tried again at home using butter with a little sesame oil, a sprinkle of garlic powder and ground ginger.

At the end, I added coconut aminos but probably too much as it was a little saltier than I wanted. I should have probably measured and put something like 1 tsp on each steak, but it definitely achieved the Asian flavor I was looking for.

My struggle overall was the cooking time and flipping the steaks without the outer leaves falling all over the place. Definitely takes some coordination and a wider spatula!

Braised cabbage

A couple of days later, I saw this braised cabbage recipe on Instagram. It’s seems we weren’t the ONLY ones thinking about cabbage!

This takes more time and definitely has more the flavor you would get if you simply boiled cabbage the old-fashioned way. I like balsamic vinegar, so I did add that to mine at the end as she suggested. I enjoyed this version, but I left off the vinegar for my husband (he’s a super taster so vinegar gets too strong for him easily).

Best tasting and fastest?

After all was said and done, my friend Tracie decided my old standby of sautéed cabbage was the one she liked best, and I certainly find it to be easiest and fastest. My aunt taught me this method many years ago, and I’ve played around with it since. So here it is for you…

Sautéed Cabbage

• 1 head green cabbage
• 2 Tbsp butter or ghee
• Garlic powder to taste

Remove 2 or three outer leaves of the cabbage (this will remove most of the dirt and blemishes) or simply give it a good scrubbing. Cut cabbage in half, then slice and “cross-slice” to get 1-inch pieces. Remove thick white ribs and core if you wish (I do…they take much longer to cook and still taste bitter…into my compost pile they go!)

Melt 2 Tbsp of butter or ghee in 12-inch slope-sided skillet over medium heat and evenly distribute all over the skillet’s surface. Add your chopped cabbage and a sprinkling of garlic powder to your liking. Cook and stir (or if you’re experienced at it, you might be able to flip your cabbage using the sloped-side of your skillet) until cabbage is completely softened and beginning to brown. So yummy you won’t even remember it’s good for you!

You can go even faster by loading your cabbage into a microwave safe 2-quart bowl with 2 Tbsp of water. Heat covered on high for 3 or 4 minutes. Add your butter or ghee and garlic powder. Stir well so all the cabbage is coated. Then heat on high another 2 or 3 minutes until fully softened. A quick take on the skillet version (but it won’t have the caramelized browning on the leaves)!

Cabbage lover?

If you are, this post might send you running to the store! If you’re not, well maybe you’ll consider trying at least one of these options just to check it out! Grab a friend (like Tracie did with me) and share the fun…cooking with a friend and then sharing the results fosters friendship, home-cooking, AND good nutrition.

Which new way of cooking cabbage will you try? Let me know in the comments below!

Here’s another cruciferous vegetable!

• The quick, frugal way to chop broccoli