Name: Sausages and Red Cabbage, Stewed
Ingredients: 1 small head red cabbage, trimmed and shredded; ½ cup good stock; 1 large slice ham, both fat and lean; 1 pint Rhenish wine or ⅓ cup vinegar; ¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper; Sausages

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 ↓

Sausages and Red Cabbage, Stewed

Ingredients

1 small head red cabbage, trimmed and shredded
½ cup good stock
1 large slice ham, both fat and lean
1 pint Rhenish wine or ⅓ cup vinegar
¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper
Sausages

Directions

Prepare the cabbage

Cut the coarse outer leaves off the cabbage, then cut it into quarters and remove the stalk.
Shred the cabbage very finely.

Stew

In a stew pan, combine the stock, ham, cabbage, and wine (or vinegar).
Set the pan on the stove and stew for at least 3 hours, adding more stock if the liquid reduces.
Once reduced to a glaze, add cayenne pepper.

Serve

Fry the sausages until cooked through.
Serve the cabbage on a dish with the sausages on top.

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.

Cabbage + peppertop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,081 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Wine + peppertop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together8,066 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Cabbage + hamtop 20% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together186 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-octenal (fatty, green).
Cabbage + winetop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together186 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Ham + peppertop 23% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together6,058 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

What each ingredient does

Red cabbage: Forms the bulk of the stew and softens into a tender, mellow base as it stews.
Rhenish wine or vinegar: Adds acidity that helps the red cabbage keep its colour and gives a sharp balance to the sweetness.
Stock: Supplies the cooking liquid that braises the cabbage and reduces to a concentrated glaze.
Ham: Contributes savoury, salty flavour and fat that enriches the stewing liquid.

The step that matters

Stewing until reduced to a glaze. Long, slow stewing breaks down the cabbage's fibres so it turns tender, while adding stock as it reduces prevents scorching. Stopping too early leaves it tough and watery; cooking too dry can burn it.

Swap the cabbage

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

Tomatofits better
Capsicumfits better
Carrotfits about as well
Cabbagethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against ham, wine, 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.

Red Cabbage65 recipes

Stewed Cabbage58 recipes

Baked Cabbage51 recipes

Cabbage Dressing19 recipes

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Sausages and Red Cabbage, Stewed