Stuffed Cabbage Rolls

marina colaizzi
Jul 1, 2020
2 min read

Full disclosure...This recipe is a little time consuming but pretty easy (and definitely worth it!). Luckily, we have been working from home and had the opportunity to prep our ingredients during seemingly endless conference calls throughout the day. The best part of stuffed cabbage rolls is that you can prep the cabbage and the sauce in advance! Here's our recipe.

4-6 servings

Ingredients:

1 large green cabbage

1 lb ground beef

1/2 cup uncooked white rice

1/2 cup finely chopped parsley

1 garlic clove, diced

1/2 onion, diced

Red wine (a splash to deglaze a pan... drink the rest with your meal!)

2 eggs

1/2 c breadcrumbs

1/2 c sauce

Sauce Ingredients:

16 oz jar of tomato sauce (we are lucky enough to have fresh jarred sauce courtesy of my Italian family, but store bought plain tomato sauce will do -- just tomatoes, nothing else!)

1 carrot, diced

1 onion, diced

2 cloves garlic, diced

1/2 cup red wine vinegar (or equal parts red wine & white vinegar if you don't have this ingredient handy -- that's what we did!)

1/3 cup brown sugar

Salt & Pepper to taste

Directions:

Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil.

Remove outer leaves from cabbage. As you get closer to the center, cabbage leaves will become more difficult to remove. When that occurs, slice the cabbage on the core side (about an inch) and place the whole head into the boiling water.

Boil individual leaves first, about 2 minutes until softened. Line a tray with paper towels for leaves to dry. Place head of cabbage into pot of boiling water and carefully remove leaves with tongs as it boils (leaves will become easier to remove as cabbage cooks). *Note: you will not use the whole head of cabbage for this recipe. Discard or save in the fridge for a future recipe.

Once cabbage leaves have cooled off, slice out the hard spine of each leaf using a sharp knife.

Preheat oven to 425*F.

Start cooking your sauce. Preheat large pot on medium-high heat, add olive oil. Once heated, add garlic, carrots, and onions to the pot. Cook, stirring occasionally, until fragrant. Add jarred tomato sauce, red wine vinegar, and brown sugar, stir. Simmer on low heat until reduced, stirring occasionally. The longer you cook this, the more flavorful it will become! Our sauce cooked for a couple of hours. *We used an immersion blender to liquify the sauce and break down the veggies after an hour of cooking. You can skip this step if you prefer a chunkier sauce.

Make the cabbage filling. In a small pan, saute` garlic and onion on medium-high heat until softened. Add red wine to pan to deglaze. Put mixture in a bowl. Add ground beef, chopped parsley, uncooked rice, bread crumbs, and sauce. Salt & pepper to taste. Using your hands, mix until combined.

Cover the bottom of a baking dish with sauce.

Start rolling your cabbage! Using your hands, shape the beef in cylinders. The size will depend on your cabbage leaves. You want to fully wrap the beef mixture with cabbage so the moisture stays inside the rolls.