Recipe Idea: Fried cabbage
Having the most frugal grocery budget in the world isn’t going to help you any if you can’t put together at least a few healthy, tasty, and cheap eats! Every month, The Outlier Model features a cheap recipe idea, along with the cost breakdown.
Fried cabbage might not seem very appetizing to some people. I guess it depends on whether or not you like cabbage! But I love cabbage and I love to just fry up a bit to go with my meals. It’s quick, easy, and cheap (… hey, isn’t that what this blog is about?!). I especially like to serve fried cabbage with perogies and sausage. Yum!
Photo credit: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:The_cut_Indian_cabbages.jpg, original author: Aravind Sivaraj
Ingredients
- 1/2 cabbage ($1.50 for a 3lb cabbage)
- salt to taste (< $0.05)
- olive oil (< $0.10)
Slice up the cabbage into 1 cm thick strips. Heat 1-2 tablespoons of oil on medium-high then reduce to medium. Add cabbage, fry, add salt (I usually use a teaspoon of salt or less per quarter of cabbage), and fry some more. If you want a bit more oomph than a bit of salt, you could a few squirts of soy sauce instead of salt while frying. 5 minutes later, you’re done! The cabbage should be cooked, but still have a bit of crunch. Make sure you don’t leave the cabbage on the hot pan because it will continue to cook and get soggy.
It sounds simple and crazy, but it’s a great little quick-fry that really brings out the cabbage flavour. Cabbage is also super healthy for you! It is a great source of vitamin C and anti-inflammatory chemicals. Many compounds found in cabbage have been shown to be beneficial in healing DNA damage, ulcers, and general inflammation. Use it as a side when you’re making meat-centric meals like roast chicken, perogies and sausage or pork tenderloin.
Servings: 4 servings
Cost per serving: $0.40 or so
Frugal hack: It’s pretty frugal.
Feeling adventurous? I personally like my cabbage fried plain, but there are lots of ideas out there. Try Fried Cabbage with Bacon – pretty tasty!
I love cabbage too, but I haven’t been buying it as much since I didn’t how to use it other than eating raw. So thanks for this reminder.
There are a ton of health benefits to eating cabbage. So many health problems come down to some kind of inflammation. And considering how cheap it is, it’s definitely a win-win.
The big problem I have with eating it raw is the prep time. Slicing a giant head of cabbage into slaw-sized strips takes forever…. and I’m actually pretty lazy :S
lol that does sound pretty lazy
Cutting up some cabbage is way less work that cutting it up and frying it. Then again I would cut mine into pretty big chunks since I’m lazy too.
That is crazy frugal, and it looks really healthy too. I’m not sure if I’m a cabbage fan but maybe I’ll give it a try anyways to see if I am.
Everything tastes good fried….
The key is just the right amount of salt!
I love cabbage. This looks delicious. I’d never really considered making it like this, good idea!
You’re welcome!
Hmmmm I’m not a big cabbage fan, but I may be convinced to try it with bacon! You’re so right…if you don’t know how to prepare the food you’re buying so it tastes good, you’re going to starve or blow your budget anyways.
Definitely! I find that adding salt (or salty things like bacon or pancetta) helps to cut through the stronger “cabbage” flavour.