Braising is my favorite cooking technique for cold weather. We’ve braised so many
meats on this channel: the shortribs, the chicken thighs, the pork shoulder, but today
we are making a vegetarian braise. We are braising cabbage. As any braise it has 3 basic
steps: sear, sweat, and simmer. One of my favorite chefs, Sohla El-Waylly made a fabulous
video about it last year which gave me an idea for this dish. Sure, I’ve braised veggies
before, but as a side dish, not the star of the show. But Sohla’s idea put the cabbage
front and center, which was brilliant. This dish lends itself to infinite variations.
Sohla did it with cashew milk. I’ve done it with porcini and sour-cream sauce, but
today I really want to strip this technique down to its essential elements. I want to
minimize the ingredients, and the prep, and keep it completely plant based and easy because
that’s what we often need in a weekday meal.
Let’s start with the cabbage. I like to use a relatively small head for this dish
so that I can fit it all into my pan. Surface moisture prevents browning, so I don’t like
washing the cabbage for the dishes that require browning. Even if you dry the outside of the
cabbage, water will get trapped between the leaves. If the outer leaves are really dirty
or bruised, just remove them. Cut the cabbage in half and then cut it into wedges. If I
cut my cabbage into 8 wedges, I’ll expose more surface area to browning, but if my pan
was smaller or my cabbage bigger, I might only do 6 wedges or even 4. You’ll have
to use your best judgement here.
Set the largest oven safe pan that you have over high heat, and add a couple tablespoons
of neutral oil with a high smoke point. In other words, something like canola or grapeseed,
but not extra virgin olive oil. When the oil is hot, salt each wedge on both flat sides
and place in the pan. If some wedges don’t fit into your pan, you can always cook them
in another pan. They only need to be in a single layer during the browning step. During
the simmering step, it’s perfectly fine to crowd the pan a little.
It’s a good idea to press down on the wedges in the beginning to keep them flat. The better
the contact with the pan, the more they’ll brown. If all the oil gets absorbed and the
pan feels dry, add more oil. When in doubt, brown more rather than less. Charred veggies
are all the rage these days. Sohla suggested getting the cabbage almost black, but I prefer
dark brown, but not black. Once the first side looks like this -- ah, look at all this
caramelization, flip it over and brown the second side. You can try flipping with tongs
or with a spatula to see what works best for you. If a few cabbage leaves fall off, it’s
really not a big deal. It will all taste good in the end.
And as always don’t forget the oil.
While our cabbage is browning, let’s preheat the oven to 350 degrees and prep our aromatics.
Today I am using a diced yellow onion, but you can add carrots and celery. Instead of
onions, you can use leeks or shallots. There are lots of options here. I’ll also slice
a couple of garlic cloves, but you can also mince them, or put them through a garlic press
instead of slicing.
Let’s take a look at our cabbage. That looks great. Let’s drop the heat to very low and
get the cabbage out of the pan and onto a plate. Our searing step is done and we are
onto the sweating step. Sweating just means cooking gently until soft -- that’s the
way aromatic veggies are usually cooked as a flavor base for a soup or a sauce. Now that
we’ll be using much lower heat we can switch to olive oil. Add about a Tablespoon. Add
the onions and a pinch of salt.
Give them a good stir,
cover and let them look until they start to become translucent. I prefer to get my onions
slightly brown as well. Not as dark as we got the cabbage, but a little. After the first
5 minutes, I uncover the pan to help them brown and to make it easier to see what’s
happening. Covering in the beginning is completely optional. I just find that it speeds things
up a little.
Add the garlic, another pinch of salt, and cook just until aromatic. Then add some boxed
or canned chopped tomatoes and a cup of dry white wine. The measurements are completely
flexible here. Since my tomatoes are completely unsalted, I’ll give them a pinch, but if
yours are sold salted, make sure you taste before adding more salt.
Bring it all to a simmer and add the cabbage wedges to the sauce. I like to fan them out,
and it’s ok to make them overlap a little to make them fit. Tuck all the loose leaves
in the middle and pour in the cabbage juices that accumulated on the plate. Cover the pan
and place in the middle of 350 degree oven for 45 minutes.
Let’s see what we’ve got. Mmm -- beautiful. Let’s crank up the oven to 450 degrees for
the final step.
To turn this cabbage into a full meal, I’ll add some cooked cannellini beans between the
wedges. I’ll link to the instructions on cooking the beans in the description below,
but you can always use drained canned beans. If you cooked the beans yourself, add some
of their cooking liquid so that the beans are almost covered. I actually forgot to do
this in the video, but don’t be like me. If you are using canned beans, add a little
water or veggies stock or chicken stock. Drizzle everything with a generous amount of olive
oil.
Place the pan into 450 degree oven uncovered to get the beans to warm up and the tops of
the cabbage to crispy up a bit. This will take about 20 minutes, but it’s good to
keep an eye on it.
And we are done! This is a really hearty and comforting dish. The cabbage turns out butter
soft and so sweet. I find that it’s sometimes necessary to adjust the salt in the end. We
salted the outside of the cabbage, but until it’s all done, it’s very hard to salt
the inside, so you might want to put some salt on the table and have everyone season
to their taste. Even the core comes out completely soft and delicious.
If you want to add another dimension to this dish, top it with sourcream or Greek Yogurt
or the tahini sauce that I made in my falafel video.
Don’t be afraid to improvise with this dish and if you come up with a tasty variation,
I’d love to hear about it. Here are more culinary tutorials for you to check out and
if you are ever in the Boston area, maybe I’ll see you in one of my classes.