My family and I live in The Midwest. Stuffed cabbage has been a big part of my and my husband’s life since we were little children. Southeast Michigan has a large Polish population too and the food is pretty popular around here. My mother’s side of the family is Romanian and my mother, aunts, and grandmother all made stuffed cabbage at the holidays. I looked forward to it every holiday. There would be a HUGE roasting pan full of theses steamy, meaty, rolled up cabbage leaves, enough for 40 adults and children. Fast forward to adulthood. I HAVE made rolled stuffed cabbage but it is a lot of work to do yourself. So I REALLY wanted stuffed cabbage so I thought shoot! Why don’t I just chop everything up and make soup instead?
I’ve been making this for more than ten years, and I think it’s my parents favorite soup I make for them. It’s great to make for friends on a winter day after snowmobiling or ice fishing. This soup makes around 8 quarts! I know it’s a lot but I’m the the type of person if I’m taking the time to make it I want to eat it, share it and freeze it for later. It’s a pretty easy soup to make. Once you brown your meat you just add the other ingredient and simmer. I put some Delishtips at the bottom of the recipe I hope you find them useful!
Tools
- 8-10 quart stockpot
- ladle
- long spoon
- cutting board
- can opener
- colander
- glass bowl
Ingredients
- 3 pounds of ground beef and pork*
- 1 medium white onion, diced-about 1 1/2 cups
- 1 cup of shredded carrot*, diced
- 4 cloves of minced garlic
- 1 Tablespoon of kosher salt**
- 2 teaspoons of pepper
- 1 teaspoon of smoked paprika
- 1 cup of long grained rice
- 1 large head of green cabbage
- 2- 28 ounce cans of crushed tomatoes-No salt added
- 24 ounces of low sodium beef broth
- 12 ounce beer
- 2 quarts of low sodium V8 juice*
Recipe
Brown the meat mix until brown. Chop your onion, garlic and shredded carrots. Use your colander to drain the meat into the glass bowl. Add your vegetables, spices, meat, rice all the liquid and then chop the cabbage into small chunks like 1-2 inch squares. Add them to the soup. Stir and simmer on low for an hour stirring occasionally. Make sure you are at a simmer not a rolling boil as the rice and meat might stick to the bottom of your pot and burn. Cook until rice is done and cabbage is soft.
DELISHTIP 1: If you can find Meatloaf Mix buy it. Some grocery stores have it or you can get it from your butcher. It has beef, pork and veal and it’s great! I can’t always get it so I use ground beef and pork.
DELISHTIP 2: I buy organic shredded carrots for this recipe and I throw the leftover in salads. If you don’t have it don’t worry about it!
DELISHTIP 3: I buy canned products with low sodium or no salt, that’s why it calls for a Tablespoon of salt. If you use SALTED products start with a teaspoon of salt. You can always add but you can’t take it out.
DELISHTIP 4: If you can’t find V8 or a Vegetable juice you can try adding tomato juice. The flavor may be a little flat so you might want to add a few teaspoons of dried herbs.