CABBAGE FOR ALL SEASONS

 

Cabbage, all dressed up for autumn.

There’s no better relish to accompany a summer’s grill meal than crunchy coleslaw. No soup more warming than a cabbage and bean potaje. For every season, there is a cabbage dish. For this transition into cold weather, here’s a cabbage recipe that can go either way. It works as a cold dish, perhaps alongside grilled salmon, or a side, cozying up with roast pork. 

The seasoning for the cabbage is caraway seed (alcaravea), a spice not nearly so common in Spanish cooking as its near-relative, cumin (comino).  Caraway turns up in the cooking of La Mancha and inland Murcia. In this recipe, I’ve called for a very small quantity, but if you like the flavor, add as much as a teaspoon of caraway. Don’t add the caraway to the cooked cabbage until you remove it from the heat to avoid turning it bitter. 

Autumn fruit: pomegranate.

The (optional) garnish of red pomegranate arils marks the dish as autumnal. The sweet-tangy flavor of this fall fruit complements cabbage, both raw and cooked. 

For a crunchy, slaw-like salad, blanch the chopped or shredded cabbage for only one minute. For crisp-tender, boil about five minutes. For completely soft vegetables, cook the cabbage 15 minutes.  

Cook cabbage crisp-tender. 

Cabbage, raw or cooked, cold or hot, makes a fine side dish with meat, chicken, fish.

Crisp croutons and jewel-like pomegranate give cabbage a fancy touch.

Murcia-Style Cabbage with Garlic and Caraway

Col Estilo de Murcia

2 pounds cabbage (8 cups, chopped)

2 tablespoons white wine vinegar

1 tablespoon salt

½ teaspoon coarse salt

10 peppercorns

1/8 teaspoon caraway seeds

¼ cup olive oil

3 cloves garlic, sliced

1 cup diced bread (1-2 slices, crusts removed)

2 tablespoons lemon juice

Pomegranate to garnish (optional)

Chop cabbage in pieces.

Remove outer leaves and core of the cabbage.  Chop the cabbage into small pieces. Bring a pot of water (about 10 cups) to a boil. Add the vinegar and 1 tablespoon of salt. Add the chopped cabbage and cook to desired doneness, about 5 minutes for crisp-tender. (Save a cupful of cabbage cooking water.) Drain the cabbage.

In a mortar crush the coarse salt, peppercorns and caraway seeds. Reserve.

Heat the oil in the same pot in which the cabbage cooked. Fry the sliced garlic and diced bread just until they are golden. Skim them out. Return the cabbage to the pot with the remaining oil. Reheat the cabbage in the remaining oil, adding some of the reserved cooking water, if necessary. Remove from the heat and stir in the spices from the mortar. 

Immediately before serving, toss the cabbage with the fried garlic and croutons. Garnish the cabbage with kernels of pomegranate, if desired.  

More cabbage recipes:

Cabbage and Potato Gratin.

Stuffed Cabbage with Meat.

Stuffed Cabbage Rolls.

Cabbage and Sausage with Pine Nut Picada.

Red Cabbage with Prunes.

Red Cabbage Slaw.

Navarra Pork and Cabbage Soup (Garbure).

Mallorcan "Dry" Cabbage Soup.

Sausage-Potato-Cabbage Cakes (Trinxat).

Cole Slaw with Olive Oil.