Dirty Cabbage
Dirty cabbage is a layered one pot meal. You cook off some bacon and remove it. Add ground chuck and kielbasa to the bacon grease. Add tomato paste, peppers and onions. Flour, seasonings, garlic, worcestershire and beef broth. Add a full head of cabbage and let it reduce. Add bacon back in.
What You Need for Dirty Cabbage
| Ingredient | Notes |
|---|---|
| Ground chuck | 2 lbs of ground chuck. Ground beef 80/20 will work as well. |
| Bacon | Cut up into 1/4 inch pieces. This will go in first and come out first. |
| Kielbasa | Sliced into 1/4 inch rounds and then cut into quarters. |
| Cabbage | A large head. Remove the hard center. Roughly chop the leaves into large squares. |
| Pepper and onion | Roughly chopped like the cabbage. Pepper can be any color. |
| Tomato paste, flour, beef broth, worcestershire | This will make your sauce. |
| Creole seasoning, smoked paprika, garlic, salt and pepper | These will be your seasonings. |
Amounts listed in the recipe card below.
Chop It Up
You want nice big squares. Not too small or big. Just a bit chunky. Peppers, onion and cabbage should all be roughly chopped.
You want the pieces to be on the bigger side because it’s cooking so long. Cabbage will be simmering in the pot for 25-30 minutes. If you dice everything you will have nothing but sauce at the end of cooking. Everything will melt into the sauce and you will lose all your different flavors.
By chopping it all up big it allows the vegetables to remain intact. You will still have cabbage that tastes like cabbage. And peppers that taste like peppers.
Cabbage will need the hard center cut out of it.
Directions
Peppers, onions and cabbage roughly chopped and placed to the side. Measure out your other ingredients.
Add bacon to dutch oven and cook until crispy.
Remove bacon from pot leaving all the grease.
Add ground chuck and kielbasa. Let sit for a couple minutes then break up and stir together.
Once beef is cooked add tomato paste and cook for a minute.
Add peppers and onion. Cook for about 3 minutes.
Sprinkle in flour and mix. Add seasonings and garlic for about 30 seconds.
Pour in worcestershire and beef broth. Stir together.
Simmer for 3-4 minutes.
Add cabbage.
Cook without lid for 25-30 minutes. Stir occasionally. Cabbage should reduce to about half.
Stir bacon back in and serve.
See recipe card below for times and temperatures.
Do Not Cover
Make sure you leave the lid off while the cabbage is cooking.
Cabbage has a lot of water in it. When you put a lid on the pot the water from the cabbage will condense on the lid and drip back down into the pot. Leaving you with a watery mess and no reduction.
With the lid off the water from the cabbage will evaporate. Allowing your liquid to reduce and the cabbage to shrink in half.
It will seem like too much cabbage when you add it in. In 25 min it won’t seem like too much anymore.
Author’s Notes
Very Very Fun To Make
This is perfect for dinner and it’s very very fun to make. It is incredibly tasty, so I highly recommend it.
You can serve it with some bread, with some sourdough, whatever you want. Or even some white rice, steamed rice, or whatever is your favorite side.
Miguel
Tips From Miguel
- Chop everything up big. Not diced just rough chopped.
- Cut out the hard middle of the cabbage. It will not reduce.
- Do not drain bacon grease. You will use it to cook the beef.
- Leave lid off. Cabbage needs to reduce.
- Add bacon back in at the end. It will become mushy if left in the pot.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can I use another type of sausage?
I used kielbasa. But any type of smoked sausage will work. As long as it can stand up to a long cook time.
Why do you take the bacon out and add it back?
By removing the bacon you are able to render all of the fat, which we will use to cook our beef. If you left it in for the entire cook time the bacon would become limp.
What can you eat this with?
White rice steamed. Or some sourdough bread. Something to soak up the goodness at the bottom of the pot.
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Dirty Cabbage
Ingredients
Equipment
Method
- Roughly chop the onion and bell pepper into chunky pieces. Remove the hard center core from the cabbage and roughly chop the leaves the same way. Set everything aside and measure out your remaining ingredients.
- Cut the bacon into roughly 1/4 inch pieces. Slice the kielbasa into 1/4 inch rounds, then cut each round into quarters.
- Heat a large Dutch oven or deep pan over medium heat. Add the bacon and cook until crispy. Remove the bacon and set it aside. Do not drain the bacon fat.
- Add the ground chuck and kielbasa directly into the bacon fat. Let everything sit for 1 to 2 minutes, then break up and mix the meat and sausage together. Cook until the beef is completely cooked through.
- Add the tomato paste and mix it into the meat. Cook about 1 minute.
- Add the chopped bell pepper and onion and cook about 3 minutes, stirring everything together.
- Sprinkle in the flour and mix well. Add the Creole seasoning, smoked paprika, salt and optional black pepper, then the garlic and cook about 30 seconds.
- Pour in the Worcestershire sauce and beef broth, stirring to combine. Let it simmer 3 to 4 minutes so the sauce comes together.
- Add all of the chopped cabbage. It will look like far too much. Keep the pot uncovered the entire time so the steam can escape.
- Simmer 25 to 30 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the cabbage is tender and has cooked down to roughly half its original volume.
- Stir the crispy bacon back in, taste and adjust the salt, and serve. Finish with fresh parsley if you like.
