Any-Way-You-Like-It Stuffed Cabbage

Went to a Paleo potluck this weekend and one of the dishes was stuffed cabbage. It was MY FAVE main dish! I wanted to sneak the pan off the table and into the trunk of my car. In fact, i would have but I think I may very well have been beat down by the masses -- it really was THAT good. I decided to ask for the recipe but that got my own wheels turning - i thought - this would be a GREAT way to get my Chinese food (egg rolls) fix -- so i decided to stuff it with shrimp, ground pork, scallions and ginger... I've eaten this for the last 3 meals! I'll post the original recipe as well because i think it shows that you can stuff these with pretty much any meat/veggie combo! Play around with this! I'm sure you'll love it too! :)

Cabbage Wrappers

Cut the core out of the cabbage but leave it whole. [Angle a knife and cut about 2 inches all the way around the core] Place it, with the empty core area facing up, in a large bowl. Boil a small pot of water and pour the water over the cabbage and let it sit for 10-minutes. Drain the head of cabbage. Pull off large leaves, cut out the large vein — if the leaf is very large, you can make two rolls from each, if it is smaller, you can cut the vein out partially and pull the sides to overlap before you roll it into one roll. Pat the leaves dry with towels. Roll about 2 - 4 Tbsp filling in each leaf (depending on the size of your leaf) then arrange them in a baking dish and bake for 20 minutes.

Asian Stuffed Cabbage Filling

1 lb wild caught shrimp - chopped

1 lb ground pork

1 bunch scallions - sliced

1/4 c shredded carrots

1/4 c shredded purple cabbage

1 tsp grated ginger

1 Tbsp 5-spice powder

2 Tbsp Tamiri (wheat free soy sauce) or coconut aminos

2 Tbsp coconut oil

salt and pepper to taste

Melt oil in pan then add scallions, carrots, cabbage and ginger

Add meat when veggies are thoroughly sweated - about 5 minutes. Cook through

Add 5-spice powder, tamiri then salt and pepper to taste

Original Stuffed Cabbage Filling

1 lb Italian sausage

1 lb grass-fed ground beef

6 sliced of bacon - chopped

1 onion - diced

1 c sliced mushrooms

1 15 oz can Tomato sauce

1 Tbsp paprika

salt and pepper to taste

Brown bacon and remove from pan.

Add veggies to bacon fat and saute until translucent.

Add sausage, beef and cook through.

Add bacon, paprika, tomato sauce and salt and pepper to taste.