Potatoes in the filling of these vegan stuffed cabbage rolls positively impact the health of bone and cartilage tissue. Meanwhile, the cabbage that wraps around the potato and mushroom filling helps prevent breast cancer and halts macular degeneration, guarding against age-related vision loss.
Ingredients: cabbage leaves – 12; potatoes – 400 g; mushrooms – 300 g; onion – 1; carrot – 1; tomato paste – 200 g; bay leaf – 1; vegetable oil – for frying; dill – a small bunch; salt – to taste.
Peel and boil the potatoes in salted water. Mash the cooked potatoes, draining some water into a cup and adding it back to the mash if needed.
In a pan, sauté the finely chopped onion and grated carrot in oil, then add the mushrooms and cook until tender. Mix this with the potato mash, seasoning with salt and chopped dill.
Blanch the cabbage leaves, removing them from the water (but do not discard the water), trimming the thick veins, and filling them with the potato mixture to form the rolls.
Heat oil in a skillet and fry the stuffed cabbage rolls until golden brown on both sides. Once browned, transfer the rolls to a pot. Pour a little of the cabbage cooking water into a bowl, dissolve the tomato paste with salt, and pour it over the rolls, ensuring the liquid covers them.
Sprinkle the rolls with chopped dill, add the bay leaf, bring to a boil, and simmer for 20 minutes with the lid on over low heat.
Life Hack
You can boil the cabbage head whole in a pot, removing the leaves one by one as they soften. However, there’s a way to get soft cabbage leaves for the rolls without boiling: simply process the head in a microwave or steamer. First, remove any damaged outer leaves from the washed vegetable, wrap the head in two layers of plastic wrap, and microwave it on medium power for 10 minutes. After cooling, unwrap the cabbage, remove the core, and separate the leaves. In a steamer, a medium cabbage head will reach the desired softness in 15 minutes, with the top layer of leaves softening in just two minutes. Continue processing the head, removing ready leaves every two minutes. Pre-softened cabbage leaves for the rolls can be frozen and stored in the freezer.