Boiled Cabbage
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Wash and quarter the cabbage, keeping it intact.
Boil the cabbage
In a large pot, bring 4 quarts of water to a boil.
Add baking soda and salt to the boiling water.
Boil the cabbage covered for 10 minutes.
Remove the cover and boil for an additional 20 minutes.
Serve
Serve with a sauce similar to that used for cauliflower.
Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.
Explore the science
What each ingredient does
- Cabbage
- Forms the main body of the dish, becoming tender as it cooks through.
- Baking soda
- Raises the water's alkalinity, which helps cabbage soften and keeps its color bright.
The step that matters
Removing the cover after 10 minutes. Uncovered boiling lets volatile sulfur compounds escape, reducing the strong cabbage odor that a covered pot would trap in the kitchen. Timing the second 20-minute boil keeps the cabbage from turning mushy.
“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.
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