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Cut Red Cabbage

A boiled and sautéed red cabbage dish flavored with oil, butter, vinegar, onion, pepper, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 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 ↓

Cut Red Cabbage

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut the red cabbage into small pieces.

  2. Boil the cabbage in water until tender.

  3. Drain the cabbage and place it in a stewpan.

Cook and serve

  1. Add oil, butter, water, vinegar, chopped onion, pepper, and salt.

  2. Simmer until all the liquid is evaporated.

  3. Serve hot or cold.

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 + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,001 recipes

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

  3. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

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

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

  5. Vinegar + oniontop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,226 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

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

What each ingredient does

Red cabbage
Forms the main body of the dish and softens when boiled until tender.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the flavor and helps red cabbage keep its colour.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, giving a smoother mouthfeel to the finished cabbage.
Oil
Adds fat that carries flavor and helps the cabbage cook in the pan.
Onion
Contributes savory sweetness and aroma as it cooks down with the cabbage.

The step that matters

Simmer until all the liquid is evaporated. Cooking off the liquid concentrates the flavors and keeps the cabbage from turning soggy. Stop too early and the dish stays watery; go too far and it may scorch on the bottom of the pan.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Mustardfits better
  2. Radishfits better
  3. Capsicumfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cabbage, 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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