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Cabbage, Red, Stewed

A stew of red cabbage cooked with butter or beef dripping, vinegar, stock, and seasoned with salt and pepper, served with sausages.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Cabbage and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,081 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Cabbage, Red, Stewed

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Prepare the cabbage as if for pickling.

  2. Melt the butter or beef dripping in a saucepan.

Cook

  1. Add the cabbage and cover it with vinegar and stock.

  2. Cook until the cabbage is tender, about one hour.

  3. Season with salt and pepper, then drain.

Serve

  1. Serve on a hot dish with sausages arranged around it.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

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

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Cabbage + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,081 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Cabbage + vinegartop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,924 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Vinegar + peppertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  4. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  5. Butter + vinegartop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,513 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Cabbage
Forms the body of the stew and becomes tender as it cooks slowly in liquid.
Butter or beef dripping
Adds fat for richness and carries flavor through the saucepan.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens the flavor and helps the cabbage keep its red color.
Flavored stock
Supplies the liquid that braises the cabbage and adds savory depth.

The step that matters

Cook until the cabbage is tender, about one hour.. Cabbage needs slow, steady simmering in liquid to soften its tough fibers. Stopping early leaves it firm and bitter-tasting, while overcooking turns it mushy.

Swap the cabbage

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, vinegar, pepper):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Mustardfits better
  3. Cabbagethe original
  4. Onionfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, vinegar, pepper. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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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