Cabbage Casserole with Beef Mince and Fresh Herbs

"This cabbage casserole with ground/minced beef and fresh herbs is a shortcut to the traditional stuffed cabbage rolls. Easy and quicker to prepare, yet super delicious. Stuffed cabbage rolls is one of those dishes that has grown hugely over the years in my family, starting with my children and my husband not being such fans of it initially to nowadays asking for it if I don’t make it in a while. Lucky for them, I do make them almost, almost whenever we fancy them. Cabbage is not always everybody’s cup of tea but trust you me, this dish will be loved even by those that are on the fence with madame cabbage. It is a dish packed with goodness, vitamins and minerals, loads of fiber and it’s delicious too. Winner!"

NotesI only use oil if the meat is really lean, but if the beef has a fat content of anything more than 5% then I don’t use any oil at all.
I have mentioned a decent amount of cayenne pepper which is half a teaspoon but you can go for more or a lot less depending on your palette, spiciness tolerance and threshold.
If you’re using fresh cabbage do go-ahead and squeeze half a lemon or even one lemon over it towards the end, but if you use sour cabbage there is no need for lemon juice.
Same with the salt- if you are using fresh cabbage you will need to season and add plenty of salt when blanching the cabbage but if you are using sour cabbage you might have to roughly chop it and put this into cold water for a good 1/2h to 1h prior to cooking it in order to de-salt it as this tends to be quite salty.
Feel free to add more vegetables to this dish if you like, anything seasonal, anything you’d like, anything in hand, anything you fancy. I sometimes add parsnip, sometimes courgettes or even aubergines that have been shallow fried priorly, these all add a really nice and different taste and flavours to the dish.

Preparation Time15 min

Cooking Time50 min