Skip to main content
Main

Cabbage, Braised

Braised Savoy cabbage with bacon, onions, carrots, herbs, and stock.

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

Why it works: Parsley and thyme match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,057 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Cabbage, Braised

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the cabbage

  1. Wash, trim, and halve the cabbages.

  2. Cover the cabbages with boiling water and add 1 tablespoon of coarse sea salt.

  3. Boil rapidly for 15 minutes, then drain well.

  4. Cut away the stalks.

  5. Sprinkle the cabbages with salt and pepper.

  6. Put 2 halves together and fasten them securely.

Braise

  1. Cover the bottom of a stewpan with slices of bacon.

  2. Place the cabbages in the stewpan.

  3. Add thickly sliced onions and carrots, herbs, and season with salt and pepper.

  4. Add enough stock to nearly cover the cabbages.

  5. Cover with a lid and simmer gently for 1 hour.

Finish and serve

  1. When ready, remove the strings and drain well.

  2. Press dry in a cloth, then shape as required.

  3. Use as a garnish.

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. Parsley + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Carrot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,053 recipes

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

  3. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  4. Carrot + thymetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  5. Thyme + peppertop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,585 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

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

What each ingredient does

Savoy cabbages
Form the main body of the dish, softening into tender layers during braising.
Slices of fat bacon
Render fat into the pan, adding richness and savoury flavour to the cabbage.
Stock
Provides liquid for gentle braising, keeping the cabbage moist and adding savoury depth.
Onions
Break down during simmering, adding sweetness and aromatic body to the braising liquid.
Carrots
Soften during simmering, adding gentle sweetness to the braising liquid.

The step that matters

Drain and press the cabbage dry. Excess water left in the cabbage dilutes flavour and makes the finished garnish soggy. Pressing it in a cloth removes surplus moisture so it holds its shape and keeps its texture.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cabbage, carrot, parsley, thyme, pepper):

  1. Parsnipfits better
  2. Turnipfits better
  3. Leekfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cabbage, carrot, parsley, thyme, 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.

You might also like

Carrot SoupCarrot Soup134 recipesRed CabbageRed Cabbage65 recipesStewed CabbageStewed Cabbage58 recipesBaked CabbageBaked Cabbage51 recipes