Colcannon!!

One complication about growing your own food is eating what you grow. So I always have an eye open for new recipes that use items from the garden. Like cabbage. Now, I like cabbage, especially as cole slaw, but when I realized I can end up with 36 cabbages from this year's garden, I realized I really do need to figure out some other way to eat it ;)

Of course, there is braised cabbage, and the always popular cabbage rolls. But when I came across a mention of the Irish dish colcannon, I knew I had found a winner - cheap, uses ingredients from the garden, and no harder to make than mashed potatoes.

There are a ton of different recipes on the web, and after perusing a few, I decided to wing it. Surprised?

I started off by cooking some chopped onions until nice and brown. At the same time, I put the taters on to boil. When done, I drained them, reserving the water. I then cooked the chopped cabbage in the potato water whilst I was mashing the potatoes, with butter, a bit of milk, salt, pepper and the onions. When the cabbage was cooked to my liking (cooked but still with a bit of crispness), I drained it, and added it to the mashed potatoes. I stirred everything together, adjusted the seasoning, then served, topped with some dehydrated garden chives.

I also rescued some stewing beef from death-by-freezer-burn, browned it, then simmered it in a "au jus" made from a packet (bad, I know, but it was hanging around the house, so I had to use it!). I also browned more onions to add to the beef. Of course, this would be perfect to make with leftover roast beef. Next time :)

Verdict? I like it, I really really like it!  I think this is a great way to "hide" cabbage while perking up mashed potatoes. And you can add so many other things - leeks, bacon (!!), carrots, etc. One recipe also showed that this can be made into patties and fried - I'm wondering how good that would be for breakfast with fried eggs?

This is definitely one "recipe" that is going into my collection!

Yum!