Cabbage and eggs
Okonomiyaki are traditional Japanese fritter-like pancakes that are great for using up a head of white cabbage. Serve with okonomiyaki sauce, Japanese mayonnaise or your favourite hot sauce. Each serving cabbage and eggs 360 kcal, 17.
Cabbage is excellent finely sliced and eaten raw in salads. When cooked, the briefest cooking methods, such as steaming or stir-frying, are best. Apart from red cabbage, which breaks the rule and benefits from long cooking, overcooked cabbage releases sulphur which reminds many of bad school meals! The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites. Read about our approach to external linking. Cabbage is a vegetable that gets mixed reviews.
As holistic health and nutrition expert Piper Gibson, AHND, TND, BCDNM, FDN-P politely explained to Mashed, “Cabbage is not easily digestedtoo much cabbage can cause gas, bloating, and even diarrhea. Yes, that’s quite some downside, or rather, backside. If you’re dining solo, or perhaps in the company of anyone with an impaired sense of smell, you might still want to indulge in this “magical fruit” since, you know, the more you toot, the better you feel. Not to mention, cabbage may be one of the most diet-friendly foods you can find. Cabbage is also pretty darn nutritious. Gibson tells Mashed this vegetable is “a great source of vitamin C, which is essential for iron absorption, immune health, and collagen formation. One more nutrient that cabbage is particularly rich in is vitamin K, something Gibson says “helps with blood clotting and wound healing.
If you are taking anticoagulants, the higher amounts of vitamin K can impact these medications’ effectiveness. One of the best things about cabbage is how budget-friendly it is. Low Income Relief has it listed as one of their cheapest, yet most nutritious produce picks. If you want to save even more on your grocery bills, however, you could always try growing it yourself.
As Gibson points out, “Organic cabbage is best and will help you to avoid any toxic pesticides,” and when you’re growing it yourself, you’ll know exactly what pesticides have and haven’t been used. What’s the safest way to eat cabbage? Good to know that eating cabbage is relatively risk-free as far as exposing you to potentially harmful environmental chemicals, but is there a safer way to eat the stuff without any stinky side effects? Gibson says that how cabbage affects you depends to an extent on your gut health, saying “those with a healthy digestive system may be more tolerant of more significant amounts of cabbage. Another suggestion Gibson has for reducing cabbage’s gas-producing properties is to cook it, since cooked cabbage may not be quite as difficult to digest as the raw stuff. Cabbage appears in a wealth of different varieties, and is in fact part of a bigger family known as brassicas that extends to cauliflower and kale.
See our recipe ideas below and also check out our collection of cabbage recipes. There are two ways to prepare cabbage, depending on how many you want it to serve, and how you want to cook it. To serve a small number of people, or for recipes when you need to keep the leaves whole, it’s a good idea to peel the leaves off individually, taking what you need then putting the rest of the cabbage back in the fridge, wrapped up. You can then use these leaves whole or shred them as needed. Depending on how old the cabbage is, you may not want to use the outer leaves, particularly if they are bruised, blemished or damaged. To serve a bigger crowd, halve or quarter the cabbage, lay it cut-side down on a board and chop or shred the leaves. For firmer cabbages, such as the red or white ones, you may wish to cut out the tough part of the stem or core first.
Put your prepared, shredded cabbage in a steamer and steam for 5 mins or until tender. Put the cabbage leaves or shredded cabbage in a large pan and cover halfway with water. Bring to the boil and cook for 3-5 mins or until tender. Transfer the leaves to cold water to refresh. Shred the leaves from half a head of cabbage, removing any tough leaf stems.
