Skip to main content
Main

Stewed Cabbage

A cabbage dish simmered in milk, butter, and seasonings, finished with egg yolk and cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓
Stewed Cabbage

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 ↓

Stewed Cabbage

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the cabbage

  1. Cut the cabbage into thin strips as for coleslaw.

  2. Boil in water for 20 minutes, then drain well.

Cook and finish

  1. Cover the cabbage with rich milk and boil until tender.

  2. Season with butter, pepper, and coarse sea salt to taste.

  3. Before serving, mix in the beaten egg yolk with a few spoonfuls of thick cream.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  4. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Milk + creamtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together29,399 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

What each ingredient does

Cabbage
Forms the main body of the dish and becomes tender through boiling and stewing.
Rich milk
Gently simmers the cabbage, adding moisture and a mild, creamy richness.
Butter
Adds fat and a rounded, savoury flavour to the cooked cabbage.
Beaten egg yolk
Thickens the finishing sauce and adds richness when stirred in off the heat.
Thick cream
Adds fat and body, giving the finished dish a smoother, richer texture.

The step that matters

Adding the egg yolk and cream. Egg yolk thickens when heated, so if it is added to a very hot liquid it can scramble. Mixing it with cream first and stirring it in before serving helps it blend smoothly into the sauce.

Swap the cabbage

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

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Cabbagethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, butter, pepper, egg, cream. 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.

More stewed cabbage recipes

Spanish 4 See all 68 →

You might also like

Red CabbageRed Cabbage65 recipesBaked CabbageBaked Cabbage51 recipesCabbage DressingCabbage Dressing19 recipesScalloped CabbageScalloped Cabbage16 recipes