Yay for recipes!

So, as promised, I bring you the recipe for the stuffed cabbage concoction that I made the other night! Now, if anyone feels like tweaking it, I'd love to hear what you added/omitted to see how you all love your stuffed cabbage! It really is super simple, less time consuming, and good, it even got Mama's seal of approval when I remembered to add the ketchup. Hahaha. 

The ketchup that I'm using is the Heinz Reduced Sugar ketchup, which, honestly, doesn't taste any different than their regular ketchup, but it only has 1 gram of carbs. At first, it took me a while to hunt it down, because it apparently used to be called "Heinz 1 Carb Ketchup" 

There's what the bottle looks like. Obviously, you don't have to hunt for the reduced carb ketchup if you have a huge bottle of regular in the house, but overall it's just a new staple in my diet, it's a super easy way to cut carbs without really having to think too hard about it.

Also, I prefer to use the portabella mushrooms in this recipe as opposed to the white mushrooms, simply because of the meaty taste they have. Some people aren't a huge fan of ground turkey, but by adding the mushrooms, I feel like it adds that taste that doesn't even make you think twice about whether it's beef or poultry. So, without further adieu, on to the directions!

Not-So-Stuffed Cabbage

Ingredients

1 tbsp olive oil

1 lb ground turkey

1 medium (ish) onion, diced

1/2 head of savoy cabbage (the wrinkly kind), sliced

1 pint portabella mushrooms, roughly chopped

1/4 cup water

1 can (14.5 oz) diced tomatoes

1 can (6 oz) tomato paste

1/4 cup reduced sugar ketchup

Parsley

Salt and Pepper to taste

Now! On to directions! Woo!

1. Cut your veggies

Cut the half of the cabbage in half again, and remove the core.



Then, I lay it back on it's side, slice it in half again horizontally:

And lastly, slice it into strips

The onions, I just do a quick dice on, and the mushrooms I give a rough chop so they're not so huge.

2. Smear the oil and brown your turkey!

Because I used a larger braising pan this time around, it's not non-stick. If you're using a non-stick pan, you can choose to omit the olive oil. And because I'm always worried that it's not enough oil, I actually used a rubber spatula to smear the oil around the pan before turning the heat on, that way I know I have even coverage.

Add the meat, and let it do it's thing on medium-high. :)

2. Turn the heat down and add the onions
 

Turn the flame/cooktop down to a medium/medium-low temp and add the onions in, letting them sweat it out a bit. After they're semi-translucent and yummy smelling, proceed to numero 3!

3. Add cabbage, mushrooms and water. Cover and let simmer, stirring occasionally.

Go ahead, toss it in, give it a tiny stir (if you can . . . I have a habit of making a mess though, so I pretty much just lightly pushed it around after this trying to make it all stay in the pan). Cover, and let simmer for about 15 minutes, I'd say, stirring every few minutes or so as the cabbage starts to cook. The water just helps the cabbage to get that steaming without worrying about the cabbage or any other ingredients sticking to the pan.

Here it is after it's cooked down a little bit:

4. Add diced tomatoes, tomato paste, ketchup, parsley, salt and pepper.

Once the cabbage is mostly cooked, you can go ahead and toss all the remaining ingredients in, let it heat up and cook the cabbage until your desired tenderness, and that's it! You're done!

5. Eat up, and enjoy. :)

 Calorie wise, for those who are counting:

4 servings - 390 calories

Now, how you serve this is honestly up to you. For now, I just put it in a bowl and eat it as is, being on an essentially carb-free diet. However, I can imagine that served over a bed of brown rice, or if you feel like splurging, a bed of mashed potatoes would be awesome. And as far as how much it makes, it really depends on how you serve it. If you do choose to serve it over rice or potatoes, then you could definitely make it 4 servings no problem. If it's all your eating though, like I do, it's about 2 and a snack size serving. Haha. 

So. I really hope you find this much easier than making standard stuffed cabbage, and enjoy it as much as I do! Good luck, and let me know how it turns out!