I had heard of Polish stuffed cabbage but not Italian, and when I first saw the recipe at Smitten Kitchen I knew I had to make it. A meatball of Italian sausage is rolled up in savoy cabbage leaves, and slowly simmered in tomato sauce. But the recipe wasn't exactly healthy, so I set about with some tweaks. I swapped out the pork sausage for chicken sausage, low-carb whole wheat bread for white bread, and low-fat milk for whole milk. But it wasn't right: the meat was too lean, so the texture and taste were a bit lacking. I tried again and went halfway, using a blend of pork sausage and chicken sausage, and the result was healthier and heavenly.
Production and cooking do take time, so set aside a lazy Sunday when you'll want to putter in the kitchen. You'll need to carefully peel and blanch cabbage leaves, make the filling, and then cook the parcels for about an hour. Another error I made the first time was buying a small head of cabbage; the larger the head, the larger the leaves, and the more likely the leaves will fully envelop the filling. The whole wheat bread also isn't as soft as white bread, and chicken sausage isn't as soft as pork sausage -- I used the food processor to blend them, buzzing the bread into crumbs and chopping the sausage up finer. Finally, I did away with the toothpicks on the second try. They're not necessary, and I don't like the idea of biting into a stray one.
The serving suggestion of mashed potatoes on the side is perfect. Although it took a bit of work to put this together yesterday, all I've got to do tonight is reheat. Joe really loved these, and I'm look forward to digging into the leftovers come dinnertime.
