[Sca-cooks] cabbage recipes

[david friedman]

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[ Picked text/plain from multipart/alternative ]
>Misha asked:
>  > Anyone have a good recipe that deals with cabbage?

Here are two, both from the Miscellany.

Russian Cabbage and Greens
Domostroi pp. 162-3

Chop cabbage, greens, or a mixture of both very fine, then wash them
well. Boil or steam them for a long time. On meat days, put in red
meat, ham, or a little pork fat; add cream or egg whites and warm the
mixture. During a fast, saturate the greens with a little broth, or
add some fat and steam it well. Add some groats, salt, and sour
cabbage soup; then heat it. Cook kasha the same way: steam it well
with lard, oil, or herring in a broth. [end of original]

Note: the ingredient translated as "sour cabbage soup" turns up
elsewhere in the Domostroi in lists of things to brew: "For brewing
beer, ale, or sour cabbage soup, take malt or meal and hops. Beer
from the first grade makes good sour cabbage soup. You can make
vinegar, too, from a good mash." This suggests that it may really be
something like alegar (beer vinegar). We therefore substitute malt
vinegar.

Version 1
2 3/4 lb green cabbage (1 head)
3/4 lb turnip greens
3 c water
meat: 1 1/2 lb beef or lamb
6 egg whites
1 c dry buckwheat groats (kasha)
2 t salt
"sour cabbage soup": 4 t malt vinegar

Version 2
2 lb green cabbage (1 head)
5/8 lb mustard greens
2 1/2 c water
1 1/4 lb pork butt roast
1/2 c cream
4/3 c dry buckwheat groats (kasha)
1 1/2 t salt
"sour cabbage soup": 1 T malt vinegar

Chop cabbage and greens very fine. Bring water to a boil, add cabbage
and greens and simmer 30-40 minutes covered. Cut meat into bite-sized
chunks. Add meat and simmer another 25 minutes (this time probably
depends on the cut of meat). Add groats, salt and vinegar, and cook
another 15 minutes uncovered on moderate heat, until the liquid is
almost absorbed. Stir in egg whites or cream, heat for a minute or
two, and remove from heat.

These are two possible interpretations of a recipe with lots of
alternatives. In particular, it is not clear whether the groats,
salt, and "sour cabbage soup" belong only to the fast-day version or
to both meat-day and fast-day versions; we have assumed the latter.

Caboges
  Two Fifteenth Century p. 6/33

Take fayre caboges, an cutte hem, an pike hem clene and clene washe
hem, an parboyle hem in fayre water, an thanne presse hem on a fayre
bord; an than choppe hem, and caste hem in a fayre pot with goode
fresshe broth, an wyth mery-bonys, and let it boyle: thanne grate
fayre brede and caste ther-to, an caste ther-to Safron an salt; or
ellys take gode grwel y-mad of freys flesshe, y-draw thorw a
straynour, and caste ther-to. An whan thou seruyst yt inne, knocke
owt the marw of the bonys, an ley the marwe ij gobettys or iij in a
dysshe, as the semyth best, and serue forth. [end of original]

1 medium head cabbage	4 lb marrow bones	1 T salt
4 c beef broth	6 threads saffron	~ 2 c breadcrumbs

Wash cabbage. Cut it in fourths. Parboil it (i.e. dump into boiling
water, leave there a few minutes). Drain. Chop. Squeeze out water.
Put it in a pot with beef broth and marrow bones. Simmer until soft,
stirring often enough to keep it from sticking (about 20 minutes).
Add saffron, salt, enough bread crumbs to make it very thick. Simmer
ten minutes more. Serve.

Elizabeth/Betty Cook