Lazy cabbage roll skillet
All the sweet cabbage, rice and tangy tomato of Eastern European cabbage rolls, simmered together in one pan with no rolling at all.
- 50 min total
- 20 min hands-on
- Anyone can make this
- Serves 4
- About $1.24 a serving
- 310 calories
- Good the next day
- Vegetarian
- Gluten-free
Dolly says: Make the full amount. It’s just as good for lunch the next day.
Ingredients
For 4 servings.
- 1 yellow onion, diced
- 1 carrot, grated
- ½ head green cabbage, cored and chopped
- ¾ cup long-grain white rice
- 1 can crushed tomatoes, 28 oz
- ½ cup sour cream (optional)
- 2 tbsp fresh dill, chopped (optional)
From your pantry
- 2 tbsp olive oil
- 1½ tsp salt, divided
- 1 tsp garlic powder
- 1 tsp smoked paprika
- 1½ cups water
- 1 tsp brown sugar
- 1 tbsp apple cider vinegar
- ½ tsp black pepper
Each serving has about 310 calories, 8 g protein, 56 g carbs and 8 g fat, and costs about $1.24 at typical US grocery prices. Both are estimates from what the recipe uses.
Missing something?
- No yellow onions? White onions or red onions work.
- No green cabbage? Red cabbage or coleslaw mix works.
- No long-grain white rice? Jasmine rice or basmati rice works.
- No crushed tomatoes? Diced tomatoes work.
- No sour cream? Plain greek yogurt works.
Steps
Tap an underlined word for a quick explanation.
the onion and the carrot. Cut out the cabbage and the leaves into bite-size pieces.
Dice. Dicing means cutting food into small, even cubes, usually a quarter to half an inch across. Pieces the same size cook at the same speed, so nothing burns while the rest catches up.
How you’ll know: Your pieces are little cubes about the size of a chickpea, and they all look close to the same.
Grate. Grating means rubbing food across the holes of a grater to make fine shreds or flakes. It spreads cheese, garlic or ginger evenly through a dish so it melts right in.
How you’ll know: Even shreds fall off the back of the grater, and you stop while the piece is still big enough to hold.
Core. Coring means cutting out the hard center of things like apples, peppers or cabbage. That center is tough and woody, so it’s the part you throw away.
How you’ll know: What’s left is all tender flesh, with no hard, pale center.
Chop. Chopping means cutting food into bite-size pieces that don’t need to be neat. Keep them roughly the same size so everything cooks evenly.
How you’ll know: Your pieces are about half an inch and roughly alike, even if none of them are pretty.
Heat the oil in a large, deep with a lid over medium heat. Cook the onion and carrot, stirring, 5 minutes, until soft.
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.
Medium heatTimer: 5 min
Add the cabbage and ½ teaspoon salt and cook, stirring often, 8 minutes, until it down by about half.
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 heatTimer: 8 min
Stir in the garlic powder, smoked paprika and rice, then add the tomatoes, 1½ cups water, brown sugar, vinegar, pepper and the rest of the salt.
Medium heat
over high heat, then cover, turn the heat to low and 25 minutes, stirring once halfway, until the rice is tender.
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.
Simmer. Simmering means keeping a liquid just below a boil, with small bubbles rising gently. It cooks food evenly and lets a sauce thicken without scorching on the bottom.
How you’ll know: Small, lazy bubbles break the surface every second or so, and nothing is churning.
Low heatTimer: 25 min
Dolly’s tip: Scrape the bottom when you stir. Rice in tomato sauce likes to catch.Take it off the heat and let it sit, covered, 5 minutes. Taste for salt.
Timer: 5 min
Serve in bowls with a spoonful of sour cream and some dill.
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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