Beef and cabbage stir-fry
Half a head of cabbage and a pound of beef become a gingery, garlicky stir-fry over rice for pennies a plate.
- 35 min total
- 25 min hands-on
- Follow-a-recipe easy
- Serves 4
- About $2.56 a serving
- 490 calories
- Good the next day
- Gluten-free
- Dairy-free
Dolly says: Make the full amount. It’s just as good for lunch the next day.
Ingredients
For 4 servings.
- 1 cup long-grain white rice
- ½ head green cabbage
- 4 cloves garlic, minced
- 1 tbsp fresh ginger, grated
- 3 stalks green onions, sliced
- 3 tbsp gluten-free tamari
- 1 tsp chili garlic sauce
- 1 lb 85/15 ground beef
- 1 cup shredded carrots
- 1 tsp sesame oil
From your pantry
- 1½ cups water
- ½ tsp salt, divided
- 1 tbsp rice vinegar
- 1 tbsp brown sugar
Each serving has about 490 calories, 28 g protein, 52 g carbs and 19 g fat, and costs about $2.56 at typical US grocery prices. Both are estimates from what the recipe uses.
Missing something?
- No long-grain white rice? Jasmine rice or basmati rice works.
- No green cabbage? Red cabbage or coleslaw mix works.
- No green onions? Chives work.
- No 85/15 ground beef? 90/10 ground beef works.
- No shredded carrots? Carrots work.
Steps
Tap an underlined word for a quick explanation.
the rice until the water runs mostly clear. Put it in a with the water and ¼ teaspoon salt and over high.
Rinse. Rinsing means running cold water over rice or canned beans in a strainer while you swish them around. It washes off loose starch and can liquid, so rice cooks up fluffy and beans taste clean.
How you’ll know: The water running out goes from cloudy to mostly clear; it doesn’t have to be perfect.
Saucepan. A saucepan is a pot with tall, straight sides and one long handle. It’s for things that need depth, like rice, sauces or a few boiled eggs.
How you’ll know: The food fills it about halfway, leaving room to bubble without spilling over.
Bring to a boil. It means heating a liquid on high until it’s fully boiling before you move on. A lid on the pot gets it there faster, which makes it a good moment to chop something.
How you’ll know: Big bubbles break all over the surface, and they keep coming when you lift the lid.
High heat
Cover, turn to low and cook 18 minutes.
Low heatTimer: 18 min
While it cooks, cut the core out of the cabbage and it into thin ribbons. the garlic, grate the ginger and slice the green onions.
Slice. Slicing means cutting food into flat pieces of about the same thickness. Even slices cook evenly, so none are raw while others burn.
How you’ll know: Lay a few side by side: they’re close to the same thickness from one end to the other.
Mince. Mincing means chopping something into the tiniest pieces you can, smaller than a grain of rice. Tiny pieces melt into the dish, so you get the flavor without biting into a chunk of garlic.
How you’ll know: Every piece is tiny and about the same size, and the pile starts to look almost like a paste.
Stir the tamari, vinegar, brown sugar and chili garlic sauce together in a small bowl.
Heat your largest over medium-high, add the beef, and press it flat. Leave it 3 minutes, until underneath.
Skillet. A skillet is a frying pan: wide and flat with low, sloped sides. The shape lets steam escape, so food browns instead of stewing.
How you’ll know: It’s the pan you’d fry an egg in, and a 10 or 12 inch one handles most recipes.
Brown. Browning means cooking until the outside turns brown, which is where a lot of savory flavor comes from. Give food room and time without stirring, or it steams and stays gray.
How you’ll know: The food looks brown rather than gray, and the kitchen smells toasty and savory.
Medium-high heatTimer: 3 min
Break it into and cook 4 to 5 minutes more, until no pink is left. Spoon off most of the fat.
Crumble. Crumbling means breaking food into small, rough bits with your fingers or a spoon, like feta or ground meat in the pan. Small bits spread through the dish, so there’s some in every bite.
How you’ll know: The pieces are small and uneven, about pea-size, with no big clumps left.
Medium-high heatTimer: 4 min 30 sec
Food safety: Ground beef, pork and lamb are done at 160°F. When it’s cooked through there’s no pink left anywhere in the pan.
Stir in the garlic and ginger for 30 seconds, then add the cabbage, carrots and remaining ¼ teaspoon salt. Cook 4 to 5 minutes, stirring, until the cabbage but still has some crunch.
Wilt. Wilting means cooking leafy greens just until they go soft and collapse. Greens shrink a lot, so a big pile of spinach becomes a small handful, and that’s normal.
How you’ll know: The leaves turn soft and deep green and slump into the pan, usually within a minute or two.
Medium-high heatTimer: 4 min 30 sec
Dolly’s tip: It looks like a mountain at first. It cooks down fast.Pour in the sauce, 1 minute, then with the sesame oil.
Toss. Tossing means gently lifting and turning food so everything gets coated, like pasta in sauce or vegetables in oil. It coats every piece evenly without mashing anything.
How you’ll know: Every piece looks glossy or evenly coated, with no dry spots hiding underneath.
Drizzle. Drizzling means pouring a thin, slow stream over the top of something. A thin stream spreads a little flavor a long way.
How you’ll know: You see thin lines across the food, not a puddle collecting underneath.
Medium-high heat
Serve over the rice with the green onions on top.
Plan this in Dollop, and get the grocery list
Dollop puts this dinner on a night that suits your week, lists only what you still need to buy, and walks you through each step while you cook.
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