Involtini di verza, or, in English "Cabbage rolls", is one of the best main dishes to prepare in the cold months when cabbage is in season.
These delicious rolls consist in pre-cooked cabbage leaves wrapped around a rich filling of minced beef, or minced sausage, if you prefer. Cabbage is a winter vegetable, typical in North-Central regions of Italy. This is one of my favourite main dishes where you can combine the vegetables and meat together in just one dish, accompanied with mashed potatoes, rice or simply with bread, making a "scarpetta" in the gravy sauce. This is why I like to cook in the pan with some garlic and white wine! But here is the recipe ;)
Serves 2.
INGREDIENTS:
6/8 large leaves of Cabbage
200g beef mince (if you like to use some sausage mince, than can combine 150g beef mince and 50g of sausage mince. Please use a traditional plain sausages flavour)
1 egg
20g grate parmesan cheese
20g fine breadcrumbs
50ml milk
1 small clove of shopped garlic
2 clove of whole garlic
1 tablespoon of chopped parsley
1/3 teaspoon of nutmeg
salt and black pepper
extra vergin olive oil
1/3 glass of white wine
fresh rosemary
food toothpicks
Carefully detach 8 cabbage leaves without breaking, and rinse under running water and keep on the side. Prepare a large pan of water and place it on a high heat. While waiting for the water to boil, start to prepare the filling. In a medium bowl, place the beef and sausage mince, breadcrumbs, parmesan, milk, salt & pepper, 1 chopped garlic and nutmeg. Using your hands, thoroughly mix everything together for a few minutes until the ingredients are combined. Leave to the side as your water starts to boil.
Now you can start to dip a few leaves of the cabbage a few at a time in the water for 2/3 minutes. Gently remove from the water with a slotted spoon and place them in a kitchen towel to let it dry and cool down.
When the leaves are cold, begin to prepare them for the filling.
With a scissors or knife, cut and remove the central rib from the cabbage leaf. Start to fill each cabbage leaf with the meat mixture. You can use a spoon or your hand to add the filling, like a ball, in the centre. Close to form a package/bundle and close it with a toothpick.
In a saucepan with 4/6 spoons of olive oil, begin to fry 2 whole cloves of garlic and some fresh rosemary at low/medium heat, until light gold (please do not burn the garlic or you change its taste). Add the cabbage rolls next to each other but not overlapping. Let these fry for a few minutes on top and bottom. Be very gentle when turning them to avoid breaking the leaves. Turn up the heat to medium-high and add 1/3 of glass of wine, letting it evaporate for a few minutes. Now, turn down again to a low-medium heat and cover the pan with a lid to help to create a gravy. Cooking time here should be around 15-20 min. or until it has dried up a little. If it dries up before the cooking time in finished, you can slowly add some warm water. Do not dry to much, leave some gravy for your bread scarpetta!!!! Enjoy :)
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