Like Mother, Like Son

I am going to steal a page from Debbie and blog about cooking/baking. I have always loved cooking and used to love watching my mom cook, bake, and such. I, unlike Debbie, am not a fan of recipes though. See, I would rather throw a little of "this" and a little of "that" and come up with some sort of awesome dish. Unfortunately things don't always come out the way I want or intend. Sometimes I find myself failing miserabley (i.e. homemade butternut squash stuffed tortellini) but stumbling upon a gold mine (i.e. butternut squash stuffed chicken). Things even out really...

However, this is not one of those blogs...it's a success story in following one of my mom's family recipes. I love her cooking and baking, as any child would, especially her turkey casserole, potato salad, beef stew, and stuffed cabbage. The last is what I tackled last night...finally!

Overall it was a little intimidating because as I thought more and more about it...it is one dish I never helped her make, never watched her make, or knew really how to make! I found her old email from a few months back and went to work.

Coring, steaming, and peeling the cabbage, cooking the meat and mixing with the rice, seasoning, and herbs. Finding a way to peel off the soft cabbage leaves without breaking them. And subsequently stuffing and rolling them effectively without falling apart in the pot!

It was a challenge, but it was one of those things that got easier with time. I'm not going to post her recipe because I can't imagine it'd be one that many people would want (more of a cultural dish). Debbie had never had it before and thought it was good, but I think she was just being a great wife (which she is of course!) and saying it. We got to talking about where the food came from, it's origin, and such. We speculated a lot, so I went on a quick search and found an informative blurb, yes it's Wikipedia but it seemed to sum things up nicely for the blog! So it looks like my mom's eastern european roots come out in this dish (Ukraine, Slovakia, Croatia).

Of course it went with saurkraut and mashed potatoes!

Not sure what dish I'll attack next but I'm enjoying trying new things. Perhaps making homemade potato pancakes...bringing in my Polish roots?

Props to my sister (or the "annonymous" person who keeps leaving comments!) on a great eggplant recipe. We've cooked that one twice. But this post is for mom!