I have about eight extra heads of cabbage in the garden that I am not using, any ideas on how to use it or preserve it, other than saurkraut.

Thanks Craig

-- craig swasnon (craig@rswcorp.com), July 28, 2001

Answers

I made a good relish (piccalilli?) last year that used quite a bit of cabbage, green tomatoes, etc. and canned several pints. I don't have the recipe - will have to get it from the library again this year. But it is very good on hotdogs, pinto beans, etc.

-- Cynthia (farmsteader@gvtel.com), July 28, 2001.

COLESLAW FOR FREEZING: 1 medium cabbage, shredded. 1 carrot, grated. 1 green pepper, chopped. 1 tsp. salt.

Mix salt with cabbage and let stand 1 hour, then squeeze out excess moisture. Add carrot and pepper to slaw then make this dressing.

Combine 1 cup vinegar, 1/2 cup water, 1 tsp. whole mustard seed, 1 tsp. celery seed, 2 cups sugar. Boil 1 minute then cool to lukewarm. Pour over slaw. Freeze in pint or quart bags. Thaws in minutes before serving.

And here is a slaw that is EXCELLENT served with fried fish. Salt down a shredded cabbage and let set 1 hour or so. Rinse. Cook 5 pieces, or so, of bacon. Make a dressing with 1-1/2 to 2 cups vinegar with 3/4 to 1 cup sugar (to taste) with a pinch dried mustard. Bring to a boil. Add salt and pepper to taste. As it cools, crumble bacon and add to the dressing and pour over cabbage. Add a sliced onion if you like and/or diced celery. Add the bacon drippings if you like. Keeps pretty good in the fridge if there are any leftovers. Enjoy!

-- Scott (Farmerwebb@hotmail.com), July 28, 2001.

Just plain freeze it. Cut it up, maybe blanch it a little then dry the pieces, then freeze them. This is so sweet my kids used to eat it as iceblocks. Got some funny looks when they talked about it to other kids, but they liked it.

-- Don Armstrong (darmst@yahoo.com.au), July 29, 2001.

Make krautburger mix: cabbage, onions, hamburger(cooked). When ready to use, put this inside roll dough and bake...great!! DW

-- DW (djwallace@ctos.com), July 29, 2001.

I agree--cut it up, blanch and freeze. We love crock pot soups and there is nothing so wonderful as a little cabbage in there! I'd love some of your cabbage as we didn't grow any this year!

-- Ann Markson (tngreenacres@hotmail.com), July 29, 2001.

I dehydrate cabbage and collard extras for soup additives. Any bust out heads go to the worm stock for feed.

-- Jay Blair in N. AL (jayblair678@yahoo.com), July 29, 2001.

I have never frozen cabbage..........how long do you blanche it??? I think I would like to try that!!! Keep learning something new here every day.

-- diane (gardiacaprines@yahoo.com), July 29, 2001.

We like it cooked on the grill. We leave the head whole, but cut the core out. Insert a stick of butter in the hole left by the core removal, wrap it in foil with the hole on top, and grill it over the coals for an hour or more until tender. It's probably not healthy, but it sure tastes good.

-- Paul (hoyt@egyptian.net), July 29, 2001.

It is also excellent shredded or cut up and fried in butter!! Man, makes me hungry just thinking about it!!

-- Brenda (CherokeeMaiden2@aol.com), July 29, 2001.

why not try sauerkraut. I tried it for the first time this year - used the recipe from Countryside and had no problems. It's super easy and took 4 1/2 weeks to ferment before I canned it.

-- glynnis in KY (gabbycab@msn.com), July 29, 2001.

Our favorite way to use cabbage is homemade egg rolls, and lots of them. They freeze well also.

-- Rose Marie Wild (wintersongfarm@yahoo.com), July 29, 2001.

Cabbage Rolls, or Casserole, or Soup --

1/3 cup regular rice(white or brown)

1 large head cabbage

1 egg

3/4 lb. ground beef

1/2 c. chopped onion

dash of pepper, salt

1 16 oz can tomatoes, undrained

1 8-oz can tomato sauce

1 Tablespoon Hungarian paprika

Dairy sour cream (light is okay)

Cook rice and set aside. Cut core out of cabbage, run hot water into the hollow to help remove 8 outer leaves (If making rolls). Chop remaining cabbage (about 6 cups) and place in a 12 x 8 x 2" baking dish (or use a round one, we're not fussy!), sprinkle lightly with salt.

Cut about 2 " of heavy center rib out of reserved leaves. Boil cabbage leaves until limp, about 3 minutes, drain, set aside.

Combine cooked rice, egg, ground feef, 1/4 cup onion, 1/2 teasp. salt and pepper, mix well. Place about 1/4 cup of mixture in center of each leaf, fold in sides and roll ends over rice. Place rolls, seam side down, on top of chopped cabbage.

In a bowl, mix tomatoes and sauce, along with Paprika. (you can add chopped cooked bacon if you like, about 4 slices) Pour over rolls. Cover and bake for 1 1/4 to 1 1/2 hours at 350 F. Serve with sour cream. Serves 4.

I have been told that if you just put the head of cabbage in the boiling water, it's much easier to peel the outside leaves off as they cook and omit a couple of steps that way.

On the other hand, I just omit those steps entirely, chopp up the whole thing, layer the meat/rice between two outer layers of chopped cabbage, pour the tomato stuff over the top and bake it. Then I save a LOT of steps. And it tastes just as good.

Or, if you really want to make it easy, brown the meat, throw everything in a pot and cover it with beef broth/stock and just serve it as soup.

-- julie f. (rumplefrogskin@excite.com), July 29, 2001.

My wife cans extra cabbage and we eat it in winter in cabbage casseroles or with sausage and potatoes.

-- Bart Dominick (Dominickwb@dot.sc.us), July 30, 2001.

Here is how to blanch: Cut up and boil for two or three minutes. Pour in to colandar and cover with ice. When cooled, place in bags. Put bags in freezer. Voila!!

Also: We love Creamed cabbage. Make a white sauce while cooking the cabbage until tender in another pot of water. Add a touch of nutmeg to the white sauce. Garlic if you like it. Drain cooked cabbage and add to white sauce. Yum!

I also LOVE grilled cabbage (you have to cook it over a screen of some kind or one of those specialty things because the cabbage falls apart and into the coals. I brush the cabbage lightly with olive oil and sprinkle a package (to taste) of the dried Italian dressing mix. Then grill until the edges are almost burnt. Also YUM!

-- Ann Markson (tngreenacres@hotmail.com), July 30, 2001.

THANK YOU ALL FOR THIS POST. We harvested 80 lbs of cabbages from the garden. Put them in the outside fridge to keep until I got the cherries canned. Went out this morning to get them to make kraut and they were frozen. I wanted to cry! I didn't know you could freeze it. Have always made kraut with them. Anyway, it is 11:30 pm here and after reading this post, my husband is out side getting them out of the barrel he put them in, thank heavens he hadn't put them in the compost pile yet. They will be in the freezer tomorrow!

-- Andy (cabinfever@sisna.com), July 31, 2001.

Blanching - as above but you can just boil in a wire basket (or strainer, or substitute - maybe just plunge into boiling water, then wait for it to come back to a full boil) then pull out and plunge into iced water. The idea is that the brief high heat kills the enzymes that would otherwise make it degrade over time, then the ice or iced water stops the cooking, so it's in condition to be cooked properly next time. To be honest, I mostly didn't bother. If you're going to eat it in the next three or four (or even six) months, cabbage does fine just cut up and frozen. If you keep it too long, it will start to go brown, and that's what the blanching stops.

-- Don Armstrong (darmst@yahoo.com.au), July 31, 2001.