a whisk and a spoon

Everyday Dorie: Stuffed Cabbage

Stuffed Cabbage is a recipe that might be more appropriate for a book called All Day Dorie than Everyday Dorie. Never mind the three hours of cooking time (hands-off, in the oven, no big deal), I think I probably spent close to two hours assembling the dish. No joke, I had to take a coffee break in the middle of it. But that’s ok– I did it on a cold, grey weekend day when I didn’t want to leave the house and was up for a kitchen project. 

I’d never made stuffed cabbage rolls before. I don’t eat ground beef or pork sausage, so I swapped these filling meats for ground chicken and turkey sausage. I couldn’t see how I could successfully get the cabbage leaves off the head in one untattered piece without blanching the whole head, so I just did that, rather than blanch the individual leaves as Dorie instructs. It was a process of removing a few leaves at a time and re-dipping the head in water to easily peel off the next layer, and I do have some leftover blanched cabbage still on the head, but I’ll use that in a soup or make okonomiyaki with it this week. I was able to fill and roll the leaves pretty easily and I skipped the step of securing them each with a toothpick. They were fine.

For the tomato sauce, I didn’t pay attention (i.e., I totally didn’t tread the instructions first) to the fact that the ingredients were supposed to go into the Dutch oven in layers along with the assembled rolls. Instead, everything for the sauce went into the pot at once and I snuggled all the rolls down into the mix. I was kind of irritated with myself, but figured that the cook time was so long that all would be fine. And it was! These are a delicious winter dinner (or a few dinners–even a half-batch was a big batch). I didn’t really know what to serve the cabbage rolls with, as they’re kind of complete on their own, with a meat and rice filling, veggies and a sauce.  I just went with a little cucumber and sour cream salad and sprinkled some crispy fried onions on top. I also meant to sprinkle the rolls with parsley, but after all that time putting them together, I completely forgot.

For the recipe, see Everyday Dorie by Dorie Greenspan, and head over to Cook the Book Fridays to see how the group liked this one.

Everyday Dorie: Paper-Thin Roasted Potatoes

Paper-Thin Roasted Potatoes aren’t your typical roasties. If you have a mandolin hiding in a drawer, now’s the time to pull it out. Also get out the guard…fingertips are not part of the ingredient list here. Thinly sliced, oiled and seasoned potatoes and onions (or leeks in my case) are shingled down a sheet tray. They bake up crispy-curly-edged and, as Dorie says, like hot potato chips. I scaled back the recipe and set up just a half sheet pan of potatoes and leeks. I had some slices leftover, so I arranged them into a little cast iron skillet, which I just par-baked so I could easily finish it off the next morning for breakfast with some smoked salmon and an (unpictured) egg. I know my sheet tray is also unpictured (although I do have a few horrendously-lit nighttime photos on my phone), but I did take Dorie’s suggestion to add little bloops of sour cream here and there, along with a flurry of chopped scallions and cilantro, roasted red pepper bits and dashes of green Tobasco. So basically I turned a very elegant side dish into sheet pan potato chip nachos for Sunday night football, and they were awesome!

For the recipe, see Everyday Dorie by Dorie Greenspan, and head over to Cook the Book Fridays to see how the group liked this one.

Everyday Dorie: Oven-Charred Tomato-Stuffed Peppers

I have a salad for lunch most weekdays, but sometimes I like to switch it up with something more exciting than a bowl of raw veg and vinaigrette. These Oven-Charred Tomato-Stuffed Peppers were the veggie surprise of the week. Stuffed with anchovy bread crumbs, lots of herbs and cherry tomatoes, these pepper boats get roasted on a bed of garlic and more herbs for the better part of an hour, till everything is soft and collapsed. I love that the dish emerges from the oven transformed and yet still so beautifully colorful. The stuffed peppers are sweet, juicy and flavorful. I sprinkled a little salty feta cheese on top.

For the recipe, see Everyday Dorie by Dorie Greenspan, and head over to Cook the Book Fridays to see how the group liked this one.