France! Chou Farcie

Being married to a French guy has its many perks! I've experienced a whole new culture and cuisine which is always fascinating to say the least. All the cheese and wine seems never ending because I always find myself trying something new here! One of my husbands favorite meals is Chou Farcie (Chou is cabbage in French) which holds many of his childhood memories ('madeleine de Proust'). His mom was always preparing this dish during the winter since it's a typical comfort food here in France during the cold nights. He says that he remembers just eating this meal until he was stuffed and had no regrets because he knew it was healthy!

We made a date night out of this and had a blast cooking his favorite meal together! I'm sure it wont compare to the way his mom makes it, but I hope we at least made her proud! She owns her own restaurant in the city of Orleans so the bar was set high! To be honest, the sound of cabbage and pork didn't sound all that appetizing to me, but once I had my first bite, I instantly knew I was going to go for seconds! As my husband said in his adorable French accent, "I know French food isn't always pretty, but it is always delicious!"

Chou Farcie

Ingredients:

• 1 Cabbage (Chou), whole

• 300 g of ground pork

• 100 g of lardon fume, OR pancetta, OR thick bacon, diced

• 1 shallot, diced

• 1 clove of garlic, minced

• handful of parsley, chopped

• 1 tsp of thyme, + one big pinch

• 1 tsp kosher salt

• 1/4 tsp pepper

• 1 tbsp olive oil

• 2 carrots, cubed

• 1 onion, cubed

• 1 beef bouillon

• 50 ml of white wine

Directions:

Step 1:

Grab your cabbage and remove the outer dark green leaves. You will take about 2-3 layers off. The green leaves are the hardest and you want to make it easier to get to the center. Once you remove the dark green leaves, cut about 1/4 - 1/2 inch off the root. This will make it easier for you later on.

Step 2:

Bring a big pot (big enough to fit the cabbage inside comfortably) of water to a boil. Make sure to salt the water generously. Carefully add in the cabbage into the pot with the root facing up. Boil for 5 minutes, then remove and place into a strainer to let the excess water drip off. Removing it with a slotted ladle worked best! Discard the water in this pot and dry off as we will use this pot again in step 8.

Step 3:

While the cabbage (chou) is boiling, in a large bowl mix together the 300 grams of ground pork, the 100g of lardons (bacon), chopped shallot, minced clove of garlic, chopped handful of parsley, 1 tsp of thyme, 1 tsp of kosher salt and 1/4 tsp of pepper. Mix by hand all together and set aside.

Step 4:

Once your cabbage has had the time to drain and cool down, its time to grab it and very gently peel back each cabbage leaf. Your goal is to get to the center (heart) of the cabbage. The closer you get to the center, the more compressed the leaves will get and the more yellow they will become. Once the center gets to the size of a baseball, you will CAREFULLY cut it out with a pairing knife. A pairing knife works best as it is small enough to get in the heart and easy to maneuver in the core. The best way to do this is to turn the cabbage on its side and go into it at an angle.

Step 5:

Once the center/heart is cut out, slice the heart into shreds and mix into your meat mixture.

Step 6:

Grab a handful of the meat mixture, form into a ball and place into the center of the cabbage. You want it to be about the size of a baseball. Fold over the leaves onto the meat mixture. Add more meat mixture onto each layer of leaves in a ring fashion and fold the leaves over until there is no more leaves to fold over.

Step 7:

Using cooking cooking twine, tie the cabbage around the outer edge of the cabbage, and all around to secure the leaves do not open up and the meat mixture stays in place.

Step 8:

In the previously used pot, heat up the tablespoon of olive oil. Once the oil is heated, add in the chopped carrots and onions and toss around for one minute. Then add in the 50 ml of white wine to deglaze the bottom of the pan and let simmer for one minute. Add in the beef bullion cube and dissolve. Carefully and gently add in your tied cabbage into the pot, this time with the root touching the bottom of the pan. Fill the pot with water until it reaches half way up the side of the cabbage. Cover and let cook on medium low heat for 45 min.

Step 9:

Once the 45 minutes are up, removed from the pot and cut in 6ths like a pizza! Serve it with a side of the steamed carrots and onions from the pot and Voila!

Calories:

Each slice is a serving, and each serving is 280 calories! This includes the carrots & onions for the side! The portions were generous and filling but it was just so good I had to have seconds! Feel free to add a side of cooked rice (1/2 cup) which will make this meal a total of 392 calories! Pair it with a glass of nice red wine and you have yourself the perfect French dinner!

Cost:

In total this meal, which serves 6, cost us a total of 12 euros, which comes to about 15 US dollars. The most expensive part of this was the ground pork and bacon.

Bon Appetit!!