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Cabbage leaves stuffed with a savoury combination of ground beef, pork, rice and vegetables, then cooked in the oven in a creamy tomato sauce. Making cabbage rolls at home is much easier than you think!
Serve these with our Herb and Garlic Mashed Potatoes for a satisfying and cozy dinner.
Cabbage Rolls
Stuffed Cabbage rolls is a dish that every Russian and Ukrainian family makes. It’s a true comfort food for us, while managing to be quite healthy! It might be a little fiddly but not difficult at all.
Do you ever wonder how Russians survive long and cold winters without constantly coming down with colds? The secret is eating a lot of cabbage in the winter.
How is it relevant? Cabbage has LOADS of vitamin C, more than oranges! We can eat it as a salad, in soups, braised, or many other ways as well!
How to Make Cabbage Rolls
The recipe I am sharing today is my mother’s. I might’ve tweaked it a bit to make it easier but the taste remained the same.
What cabbage to use
The most traditional cabbage to use in this recipe is green cabbage, however I’ve recently been experimenting with Savoy cabbage and loved the results.
Savoy cabbage is considered to be the sweetest of all cabbages. It also adds more texture to this dish and is a dream to work with as the leaves separate much easier.
Whatever type of cabbage you use make sure it’s fresh and crispy. I found that using cabbage later in the season (around March or April) produces cabbage rolls that could be a bit tough and stringy.
Cabbage roll stuffing
These rolls are stuffed with a mixture of extra lean proteins. Ground beef and pork, caramelized onions, carrots, lots of fresh parsley and rice.
After the cabbage leaves are stuffed and rolled they are baked in a sour cream tomato sauce. It’s a one pot dish, that takes a bit of time to prepare but once it’s in the oven, it cooks hands free!
How to Separate Cabbage Leaves
My mother never did that but I use a new method for separating cabbage leaves, which is much easier and faster.
According to the traditional method you have to boil a head of cabbage for a short time until the leaves soften enough to pull them apart. Sounds easy enough but it turns out to be a lot of pain!
You have to boil it long enough for the leaves to become pliable but not too long so they turn mushy.
Then you have to pull that cabbage out of boiling water, burn your fingers in the process, cut away the outer leaves, then put it back in the water, then take it out again. Pain!
I’ve heard that it’s possible to freeze cabbage instead of boiling it with the same results. Sure enough, I froze it for a couple of days, then defrosted it and the leaves were very easy to separate and perfect for rolling! Success.
This recipe yields 10-12 servings. Basically it makes enough for two full meals.
Can I freeze cabbage rolls?
Yes! They are very freezer friendly. Just pop them in freezer bags and they will keep for at least a month. This way you’ve got delicious dinner put away for a day in the future when you don’t feel like fussing in the kitchen.
More authentic Russian cabbage recipes to try
- Braised Cabbage with Bacon and Mushrooms
- Homemade Russian Sauerkraut (Kvashenaya Kapusta)
- Beef and Cabbage Soup Shchi
- Lazy Cabbage Rolls (Easy Version)
Cabbage Rolls “Golubtsi”
Equipment
- This is an affiliate link.Cast iron casserole dish
Ingredients
For the sauce
- 250ml/1 cup This is an affiliate link.chicken stock
- 250ml/1 cup sour cream or creme fraiche, full fat
- 500ml/2 cups This is an affiliate link.canned crushed tomatoes, or passata
- salt and pepper
Instructions
- Freeze the cabbages 3 days before you need it. The night before defrost cabbage and keep them in the fridge until you are ready.
- Cook rice in plenty water the same way you would pasta until al dente for approximately 5 minutes after the water boils. It shouldn't be too soft. Drain and set aside.
- In a frying pan heat olive oil and cook onions over low heat for 7-10 minutes until tender.
- Grate carrots. In a large bowl combine beef, pork, parsley, onions, carrots, rice, salt and pepper.
- In a medium bowl whisk together stock, crushed tomatoes and creme fraiche, salt and pepper. Set aside.
- Place your head of cabbage on a cutting board, cut off the bottom and pull the leaves away from the stalk. Repeat with the second head of cabbage.
- Preheat your oven to 350F/180C.
- Clear your work space, so all ingredients are within reach. Take a cabbage leaf and cut the rib down, so it's not too thick. Put 2 tbsp of filling at the bottom of the wide part of a leaf (see picture above) and roll it like a burrito, tucking sides in. Your cabbage rolls will vary in size slightly depending on the size of cabbage leaves. You will have approximately 30-32 cabbage rolls.
- Pour a cup of the sauce on the bottom of your cast iron casserole or any other heavy bottom casserole dish and start stacking your cabbage rolls. Half way through add a couple of bay leaves and 1/3 of the sauce and continue stacking until all cabbage rolls are gone.
- Pour the remaining sauce over cabbage rolls, cover with a lid and bake in the oven for 1 hour. Then take the lid off and bake for 30 more minutes. Serve with additional sour cream or creme fraiche and fresh herbs like dill and parsley.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
What kind of rice do you use for this dish?
You can use any rice you have, Annelise as long as you pre-cook it. I used basmati rice here, not because it is authentic but simply because that’s what I usually buy.
Having never made cabbage rolls before, I really appreciated the detailed directions. The sauce did not come out thick. Itโs rather thin like soup instead. Quite tasty but very thin. I wonder how to make it thicker.
Hi Tanya, my sauce is not very thick either since there is no flour in it, it is perhaps a tad thicker than a soup. Make sure the sour cream/creme fraiche you use is full fat, which helps with the thickness. However if you like yours thicker, you can take the cabbage rolls out after they are cooked and reduce the sauce on a stovetop until desired consistency over low heat or you can mix 1 TBSP of cornstarch with 3 TBSP of water and mix it in to thicken the sauce. I hope this helps! Best, Julia
You can also make a browned butter roux and cook until smooth. Add the cooked heated sauce and cook until quite thick and then return to cooked rolls.. This is nice and thick and is even better as a sauce over potatoes.
Great suggestion, Marianne!
Hi! i made these rolls a couple of days ago following your recipe ! They taste great! However, the meat inside didn’t cook fully after the hour and thirty minutes in the oven so when i eat them i have to cut them up and recook them on a pan. i was wondering if you possibly know why it would do that, the cabbage on top was browned so they looked fully cooked. would you suggest longer in the oven or maybe precooking the meat a bit? thanks !
Hi Megan, that is very puzzling as they should definitely be fully cooked within that time period. My only guess is that perhaps they were overcrowded in the pot/pan, it’s the only scientific explanation for it as even a meatloaf, which is much bigger would cook in 90 minutes. Maybe next time try to divide them into two pans and make sure there is enough liquid that covers them. I’ve used this recipe my whole life and my mom before me, so it should work as written.
I may be too late for past batches, but maybe for future this might help. If you use a processed meat (generally the pork) with nitrate in it the meat will be cooked, but not brown. The same reason that a ham is pink, but a pork roast is brown. If you have ever put bacon on a meatloaf, it will be pink under the bacon, the sane goes for any meat with nitrates or such added.
I have made cabbage rolls for years…and have tried many different recipes. This is by far my favorite recipe! I made them for my coworkers. They know I love to cook and share. They had asked if I could make cabbage rolls, so I had to search for something amazing. This was it!! Thank you so much for sharing. I’ve added the recipe to my favorites and will make again real soon! ๐
I am so happy to hear this, Lori! It is my family recipe and I’ve always preferred it since this is how my mother made cabbage rolls and I grew up with the taste. Thank you for your feedback! ๐
I will try this soon. Here in Romania the cabbage is softened by putting it in brine for a few weeks. Then the dish is made similar to yours but only with minced pork meat. Then between the layers of rolls some pork belly slices are put. (Calories and fat). The sauce is a watery tomato sauce. this dish is erved in Romania on all festive occasions: weddings, christmas, Easter etc. in Romanian they are called Sarmale.
I think your recipe is better and will try it soon. This will get me some stern looks from Romanian traditionalists. LOL.
I love pork belly slices so much. I need to incorporate them into my recipe! Don’t worry about the traditionalists, they don’t like me either! ๐
My boyfriend was born in Russ and adopted by an American couple. I have been trying to incorporate Russian recipes to our menu. I loved this so much I sent the recipe to my mother, telling her she had to make them for my dad and siblings that still live at home. I will be trying eggplant caviar line to week! Thank you for having a “Russian” tab ๐
Wow, Heather!! That is so great!! I love promoting Russian dishes to the rest of the world! ๐
I’m Egyptian and we have a very similar dish. We add fresh chopped Dill and fresh chopped Cilantro to the dish. We put the mixture in a bowl and make a small hole in the middle of the mixture. We then fire up a piece of charcoal then add about 2 tbspn of warm ghee or butter in a small foil paper cup. We add that foil cup in the center of the mixture and once the coal is hot, we drop it in there and tightly cover it. It’s old fashioned smoking ๐ then we do exactly what your recipe calls for. It’s just to die for
Oh my goodness, Mary, I love your way so much more! Sounds incredible with all the smoking. ๐ I am very tempted to try, I hope I don’t burn the house down!
These cabbage rolls look awesome! I got the urge to make them after visiting a local russian restaurant. A question about placing the rolls into the oven safe dish: it looks like you have them stacked…do the rolls stick together at all when cooked? Also, should the sauce end up covering the rolls completely? Thanks:)
They don’t stick to each other, Matt, so feel free to stack them up. The sauce should cover them, if you don’t have enough you can always add a bit of stock. I hope this helps!
This recipe is amazing! Definitely a favorite in our house. Just FYI in my local Market Basket in the “international” aisle they sell jars of cabbage leaves. They cost around $5 but it’s nice to not deal with boiling or freezing the leaves. I have used them and they’re great! Thanks for this recipe ๐
Thanks Elizabeth! I completely agree it’s so nice not to deal with the leaves! I wish I had a similar service nearby. ๐
Does the sour cream curdle when you cook it with the cabbage rolls?
Usually sour cream curdles when cooked over intense heat so if you simmer cabbage rolls over gentle heat it shouldn’t curdle. It also depends on the quality of sour cream and how it’s made. Generally, slight curdling doesn’t affect the taste or even texture. I hope this helps, Sonya.