Corned Beef and Cabbage Shepherd's Pie

Here's a recipe I created for a St. Patrick's Day cooking class. Nope, nothing traditional about this. But, it sure is tasty! Get your corned beef in the deli - you can buy a small amount of it and it's already cooked. Or, if you cook a whole corned beef for St. Patty's Day, you can reserve a little bit for this recipe. It's a good way to stretch a small amount of leftover meat into a hearty meal.

St. Patrick's Day Shepherd's Pie

(serves 6)

non-stick cooking spray

1 pound carrots chopped

1 cup chicken broth, preferably unsalted or low-sodium

¼ medium head of cabbage, cored and chopped (about ¾ pound)

1 cup frozen green peas, thawed

1 cup frozen pearl onions, thawed

7 oz. corned beef, chopped

2 Tablespoons oil

2 Tablespoons flour

½ teaspoon dried thyme

¼ teaspoon black pepper

1 ½ pounds russet potatoes, peeled and cut into chunks

¼ cup milk

2 Tablespoon butter

½ teaspoon salt

¼ teaspoon black pepper

½ cup shredded cheddar cheese

Preheat oven to 400° F. Spray an 11x7x2" baking dish with cooking spray.

Place the carrots and chicken broth in a 3-4 quart saucepan. Bring to a boil, reduce to a simmer, and cook until carrots tender, about 15 minutes. Place the cabbage, peas, and pearl onions in a large bowl. Start the potatoes cooking in a large pot of water.

When the carrots are done, pour them and the cooking liquid over the other vegetables.Place the saucepan back over medium heat. Add the oil. Sprinkle in the flour and mix with oil. Cook for about 5 minutes, then add the vegetables, all the liquid in the bowl, corned beef, thyme, and 1/4 teaspoon black pepper. Mix to combine and pour into baking dish.

When the potatoes are tender (about 15 minutes), drain them, and put back in the pot. Add milk, butter, salt, and pepper. Mash until fairly smooth. Spread on top of filling. Bake for 25 minutes. Sprinkle on shredded cheese and bake until cheese has melted.

Stir-fried Mustard Cabbage

Cabbage is going to be very cheap soon. Every year for St. Patrick's Day, cabbage drops in price. Cabbage isn't exactly expensive to begin with, but around March 17, you can often find it for 19 cents a pound! Who says you need to use it for corned beef?

Here's an Indian take. It can be served hot or warm.

Stir-fried Mustard Cabbage
(serves 8)

2 Tablespoons vegetable oil
1 teaspoon black mustard seeds
½ teaspoon ground turmeric
1 clove garlic, minced
a pinch to ¼ teaspoon crushed red pepper
¾ teaspoon salt
1 ½ pounds green cabbage (about ½ a medium head), thinly sliced
1 Tablespoon fresh lemon juice
⅓ cup minced fresh or frozen cilantro
⅓ cup shredded unsweetened coconut

Heat vegetable oil in a large skillet or wok over medium-high heat. Add the mustard seeds and immediately cover the plan. When they get hot enough, the seeds will start to pop and they will go shooting all over your kitchen. The cover keeps them contained.

As soon as they start to pop, add the turmeric, garlic, crushed red pepper, and salt. Stir for 10 seconds. Add the cabbage and toss with spices and oil to coat. Reduce heat to medium and cover. Cook cabbage until it starts to wilt, about 5 minutes. Add lemon juice, cilantro, and coconut. Toss to combine and serve.

Adapted from Moghul Microwave: Cooking Indian Food the Modern Way by Julie Sahni, William Morrow and Company, 1990.

Curtido Rojo: Guatemalan Fermented Cabbage and Beets

My friends Deb & John (you can visit their vineyard's website) really got into fermentation when they a) became farmers - grape farmers - and b) when they found themselves with a bumper crop of garden produce. Because of their success, I decided to try my hand at veggie fermentation too.

I found I too had a bumper crop of veggies when my friends Jenny (you can read her poetry blog) and Stephen left their dog and their CSA box with me when they went on vacation. What to do with all that produce??!!

Fermentation is an ancient form of preservation. You salt things and let them sit. Bacteria that like the salty environment start to multiply, producing lactic acid along with quite a number of other "stinky" compounds. Not only does all this bacterial action preserve the food, it makes it tastier too!

Wait, that's supposed to be edible? Yes, it looks (and smells) funky but it's definitely edible.

I won't tell you it looks pretty while it's happening - it definitely doesn't! But, the end result is seriously delicious.

I used a big crock (as you can see in the photo). You need something non-reactive. Acid is produced and crockery, along with glass, stainless steel, and some plastics, won't react under the acidic conditions. A crock is big, which means that when things get bubbling, your fermentation will be less likely to escape.

I selected this recipe rather than standard sauerkraut because I had cabbage and some HUGE beets. Come March, I'm going to give classic sauerkraut a try (as John will tell you, cabbage is super-cheap at St. Patrick's Day making that a great time to make your own sauerkraut).

This is where a food processor, for the shredding of the cabbage and beets, is a huge time saver. You can do it by hand, but it will take you a while. Beets are also pretty messy if you have to shred them by hand.

Fried eggs on toast with curtido rojo. That's a yummy breakfast.

This fermented cabbage is delicious with grilled or roasted meats and eggs. The funkiness does not carry over into the flavor. Mostly, it's pleasantly tart and spicy.

Curtido Rojo (Guatemalan Fermented Vegetables)
(makes enough to fill about 4 pint jars)

1 head cabbage, red or green (it will all turn red anyway)
2 large beets, peeled and shredded
1 large red onion, thinly sliced
½ pound green beans, cut into ½" pieces
3 cloves garlic, minced
2 jalapenos, seeded and minced
½ Tablespoon whole cumin seeds
1 Tablespoon grated orange zest
1 Tablespoon dried oregano, crushed fine in your hand
½ teaspoon red pepper flakes
1-2 Tablespoons pickling salt
2 bay leaves

Remove any blemished leaves from the cabbage and discard. Reserve a couple of the next layer of leaves for covering the cabbage while it ferments.

To shred the cabbage, quarter, cut out the tough core, and shred, like for cole slaw.

Combine all the veggies, garlic, jalapenos, cumin seeds, orange zest, oregano, and red pepper in a large bowl. Sprinkle with 1 Tablespoon of salt to start. Massage so that vegetables start to release their moisture. Taste that cabbage. You should be able to taste the salt but it shouldn't be overpowering. If it doesn't taste salty to you, sprinkle on a bit more salt and repeat the massage and taste until you get to a spot that tastes pleasantly salty to you. Can't take the salt away once it's in there, so go slow.

Let veggies sit until you have a pool of brine in the bowl, up to 45 minutes.

Place the bay leaves in a large crock. Cover with the contents of the bowl. Pack down well to get rid of air pockets. When you press them down, they should be covered with the brine. Cover with the reserved cabbage leaves, place a small plate in the crock and weight it down to keep veggies under brine. Place on a baking sheet to catch any overflow while it ferments. For the fermentation stage, place in a cool place out of direct sunlight. Check daily to make sure the veggies are submerged. Press them down again if they aren't covered in brine. After a few days, it will start to foam and look pretty ugly (see photo above). That's normal. If any mold forms, spoon it off. It's also normal for yeast to start growing on top. Yeast is white and breaks into little bits when you disturb it. No need to remove it.

Taste the cabbage after about 4 days. It will just be starting to get a tang. I fermented mine for 2 weeks and it had the perfect amount of sour for me. Experiment and ferment it to the acidity that you like.

To store, pack veggies into pint jars. Cover top of jar with a small square of parchment or waxed paper, then cover with jar lids and screw down but not too tight. If you store it in the fridge, fermentation should stop, but it's best to give any gas a way out - so don't screw the lids down too tight. I found that after the jars went in the fridge, the cabbage absorbed all the brine. At this point you shouldn't have any trouble with mold so that's OK.

Adapted from Fermented Vegetables by Kirsten K. Shockey & Christopher Shockey, Storey Publishing, 2014.

Red Cabbage plus more Red Stuff

Red cabbage makes me think of fall, and with falling temperatures here in Colorado, my mind is coming around to approaching nippy weather. Red cabbage has an affinity for apples, one of the best fall crops around. So, why not combine a bunch of red things: red cabbage, red apples, and red onion? This sweet and sour cabbage recipe isn't anything particularly new, but I have toned down both the sweet and the sour. Too many sweet and sour recipes are far too sweet for me. If you take down the sweet, you need to tone down the sour too, or the flavors get out of balance.

The long cooking is necessary for 2 reasons:

1. It takes quite a while for the cabbage to cook to tender. Traditionally, this type of cabbage is cooked under very tender.
2. The allspice is an aggressive spice and the long cooking mellows it. 

Red X 3 - Red Cabbage with Red Apples and Red Onion
(serves 6-8)

2 Tablespoons vegetable oil (I like sunflower oil)
1 medium red onion, peeled and sliced
½ teaspoon ground allspice
¼ teaspoon ground mace
½ medium head of red cabbage, cored and thinly shredded
1 red apple such as Fuji or Gala, cored and medium diced
2 Tablespoons cider vinegar
2 Tablespoons maple syrup or brown sugar
1 teaspoon kosher salt

Heat the oil in a large covered skillet or sauté pan over medium heat. Add onions until onions are very tender. If you have the time, keep cooking until they start to brown and caramelize because they taste even better with long cooking. Stir them often so they brown evenly. Add the allspice and mace, and stir to combine.

Add the remaining ingredients. Stir to combine. Reduce heat the medium-low, cover, and cook for 30-45 minutes until cabbage is very tender. Check to see that there is still some moisture in the bottom of the pan about ½ through cooking. Add a couple of tablespoons of water if it is dry.

Photo: By Thamizhpparithi Maari (Own work) [CC BY-SA 4.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

Unstuffed Cabbage

This recipe is my grandmother's, passed on to me via my mom. Stuffed cabbage is a complicated process: make the filling, blanch the leaves, stuff and roll up the leaves, braise for a long time. Delicious it may be, but you will spend a chunk of your day pulling it off. I haven't made this recipe in years because it's so much work. It is so good and very special...

Six months after my grandmother died, I found a stash of stuffed cabbage buried in the freezer. She had come to visit after the birth of my daughter, and left me with her wonderful stuffed cabbage. Finding that stuffed cabbage was a pretty emotional experience and I relished every bite of my grandmother's last food production in my life.

Besides simplifying the stuffing process, I have modernized the recipe by cutting back on the meat. I replaced some of the meat with cooked lentils. It's still a stick-to-your-ribs, sweet and sour dish. It may not remind you of your grandmother, it will give you some idea of my memories of my dear grandmother.

Unstuffed Cabbage
(serves 8)

non-stick cooking spray
1 large green cabbage
½ teaspoon kosher salt

Lentils
½ onion, chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
¼ teaspoon black pepper
½ teaspoon kosher salt
¾ cup lentils, rinsed
4 cups water

Stuffing
1 pound ground meat (beef, pork, turkey)
½ onion, chopped
1 cup cold cooked rice
1 egg, beaten
1 ¼ teaspoon kosher salt
½ teaspoon garlic powder
½ teaspoon black pepper

Sauce
1 ½ Tablespoons oil
2 Tablespoons flour
2 cups commercial beef stock
¼ teaspoon dried thyme
2 14 oz. cans diced tomatoes, drained
¾ cup raisins
½ cup crushed gingersnaps (about 6 2" cookies)
¼ cup packed dark brown sugar.
juice of 1 lemon, about ⅓ cup
1 teaspoon kosher salt (see Note)

Place all the Lentils ingredients in a medium saucepan. Bring to a boil, reduce to a simmer, and cook for 30 minutes until lentils are tender. Drain well and set in the fridge to cool slightly.

While the lentils are cooking, peel off the large outer leaves from the cabbage and set aside. Cut the remaining cabbage into quarters, core, and slice. Spray a large Dutch oven with non-stick spray. Put all the sliced cabbage in the Dutch oven and sprinkle with the salt. Lay half of the big leaves over the sliced cabbage. Set aside while you make the stuffing.

Preheat the oven to 325°F.

Wipe out the lentil saucepan. Heat the oil in the pan over medium heat. Whisk in the flour and cook for a few minutes until the roux is golden. Whisk in the beef stock and dried thyme. Bring to a boil and whisk until the stock thickens slightly. Set aside.

Combine all the Stuffing ingredients in a large bowl. Add the lentils and mix to combine. Spread the stuffing over the cabbage leaves in the Dutch oven. Lay the rest of the cabbage leaves over the stuffing.

Combine the beef stock sauce, and the remaining sauce ingredients in the bowl you mixed the stuffing in. Pour over the top of the cabbage, poking the cabbage at the edge of the pot so that some of the sauce drains down along the edge.

Cover the pot and place in the oven for 2 hours. Remove the cover and cook for another 30 minutes until the cabbage is very tender and the sauce has reduced. This is a dish that improves with reheating. Make it ahead, chill it down, then reheat it. The flavors become more harmonious and smooth.

As you probably figured out from my story above, stuffed cabbage (or unstuffed cabbage) freezes very well.

Note: I used commercial beef stock (Better Than Bouillon is my preferred brand in instant broth). If you use homemade or unsalted stock in the box, you will need to add more salt to the sauce.

Yucatan Cabbage-Pineapple Salad

A delicious tropical twist on cole slaw - it's from a great cookbook with a punny name: Lettuce in Your Kitchen by Chris Schlesinger and John Willoughby. Lots of fun, bold salads in here. I doctored their recipe up a little and cut it down. They must be very hungry guys because their recipe, that is supposed to serve 4-6,  can easily serve 10. Unless you are serving this for a party, you really don't need that much salad. You'll feel like you are eating it forever!

Yucatan Cabbage-Pineapple Salad
(serves 6)

Dressing
1⁄2 cup Pineapple Juice
1⁄3 cup Olive Oil
2 tbl Fresh Lime Juice, about 1 lime
1 tbl Chipotle Peppers In Adobo, minced (if you are a chilehead, add 2 tbl)
2 cloves Garlic, minced
Salt And Black Pepper

Salad
1 medium Mango, peeled and cut into 3⁄4" dice
1⁄2 small Pineapple, peeled, cored and cut into 3⁄4" dice
1⁄2 small Green Cabbage, cored and cut into thin strips
1⁄4 cup Chopped Cilantro
1 medium Red Bell Pepper, seeded and cut strips
Salt And Coarsely Ground Black Pepper

In a small saucepan, bring the pineapple juice to a boil over high heat. Reduce heat to medium and boil until juice is reduced to a thick syrup. Remove from heat and cool to room temperature.

Combine pineapple syrup with remaining dressing ingredients and mix well.

In a large bowl, combine salad ingredients. Give the dressing another stir and add to salad. Toss to dress. Season generously with salt and black pepper.

Link to PDF of Yucatan Cabbage-Pineapple Salad