Red Cabbage

Today's the day ........................for a recipe

We have a few visitors arriving over the next few days and I've been planning what we'll be eating.  I wanted some veg that would be a little bit out of the ordinary - and that's when I thought of making some red cabbage with apple.

I've done the shredding bit and when it's finished soaking in the salted water, I'm going to cook my red cabbage and freeze it.  Red cabbage is a brilliant thing to have in your freezer because apart from being delicious with lots of foods, it's so easy to cook from frozen - it's ready in minutes.  And at this time of the year, it makes good use of those windfall apples. 

Here's the recipe if you fancy making it .........………….

Ingredients
1 small red cabbage
salt
1 oz butter
1 onion (chopped)
2 large cooking apples (peeled, cored and chopped)
boiling water
3 tblsps vinegar
1 oz caster sugar

Method
Remove outer, damaged leaves and cut the cabbage into quarters. Cut away the centre core and shred the cabbage finely. Cover with cold salted water and leave to soak for 1 hour.

Melt the butter in a large saucepan. Add the onion and fry gently for about 5 mins until soft. Add the red cabbage lifted straight from the salt water. Add apple and sufficient boiling watr to cover the base of the saucepan generously. Add vinegar and sugar. Cover with a lid, bring up to the boil and simmer for about 45 mins until cabbage is tender. Add a little extra water if needed and occasionally stir or press the cabbage with a potato masher to help pulp the apples. Cool as quickly as possible and then spoon into freezer bags, tie tightly and freeze.

To serve: While still frozen, place in a saucepan along with a knob of butter. Heat gently, breaking the block of cabbage up with a fork as it heats. Heat through until simmering.