Friday, Dec. 15, 2006

Holubki Recipe


While the ancestors contributing to my heritage are from a variety of backgrounds -- Czech, Irish, Welsh, Dutch, Cherokee, English, German, and who knows what else -- Czech makes up the largest chunk of that. One of the Czech dishes that Dad's mom makes, that I absolutely love, is holubki, or cabbage rolls. We make them all the time, but in the last ten years or so, Dad has taken to bringing them as our contributing potluck dish to Christmas Eve with Mom's side of the family.

I know there's folks out there, like my mother, who don't like cabbage though I can't imagine such an existence, myself. This dish is one of my absolute favorites.

INGREDIENTS:

* 1 large head of cabbage
* 1 to 1/2 pounds lean ground beef
* 1/2 cup instant rice or cooked rice
* 1/2 teaspoon salt
* 1/8 teaspoon ground black pepper
* 1/2 cup finely chopped onion
* 3-4 cloves of garlic
* 1 can (10 1/2 ounces) tomato paste, undiluted
* 1 can (14.5 ounces) tomatoes
* 2 small cans of tomato sauce
* whatever spices you enjoy

PREPARATION:
Cook the cabbage leaves in boiling water or steam until they are wilted. Cool. Mix together ground beef, rice, onion, garlic, salt, spices and pepper.

Roll a few tablespoons of the meat mixture together in your hands, and then roll it up in a cabbage leaf. You can use toothpicks to keep the rolls closed or together while cooking. Combine the soup and tomatoes in a Dutch oven or a pot big enough to contain the cabbage rolls plus the various tomato products. Place cabbage rolls in the pot. Cover and simmer for 1 1/2 to 2 hours. Serves 4-6.

saturncat at 9:57 p.m.

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