This is an quick weeknight dinner using just a few standard ingredients. Cabbage is the base here and after that, the sky, or the remnants of your vegetable drawer, is the limit as to what other vegetables can be used; beets, any greens, zucchini, turnips, leeks, winter squash, really anything that will shred. You don’t want too big of chunks because they won’t cook enough.
I got the recipe from Smitten Kitchen. I’ll copy and past the full recipe at the end of this post but follow the photos and you’ll see how easy this are.
I feel like these are blog worthy because they are loaded with vegetables and little else, just eggs and flour and salt and pepper and like all my favorite recipes this one is more than a sum of its parts. All the vegetables magically meld into a crispy crust with a creamy middle.
You will need about 8 cups total of any shredded vegetables and any kind of flour you like. Whole wheat or garbanzo flour is so good here, and gluten free works great too. I had a little too many vegetables this time but it was still ok.
You mix the shredded vegetables with flour and salt and pepper, mix that really well then add the eggs.
Mixed up it will look a little like coleslaw. Here I can’t stress enough; it will seem really dry and like it will never ever hold together and form a pancake. Look at this picture and trust me. It will work. If you panic and add more egg it will be ok, but it will be more egg than vegetables and that isn’t what we are after here. The vegetables are the star. Let them be the star.
Now, heat a skillet to medium and add some oil. I use a 1/3 cup measuring cup to portion each pancake. It looks pretty dry and hopelessly unable to hold together right?
Smoosh them down a little and let them cook for 2 1/2 to 3 minutes on each side. If you are having trouble flipping them they aren’t cooked enough. Chill a minute, breathe, and let them cook a little longer and try again. After one or two you will get the heat and timing right.
Look at that. All the vegetables sort of melt together into a party.
This makes a lot. Plenty for 4 people, leftovers are great if you aren’t 4 people. I really like these as a side with soup or topped on something like a Caesar salad.
Any dipping sauce or salad dressing is perfect with these. The original recipe suggests an Asian flavored sauce. I like them with a green goddess or Ranch dressing and sometimes I mix BBQ sauce and mayonnaise and hot sauce (sounds weird I know, but it’s delicious). Yogurt with a little lemon or lime is nice, chimichurri, or pesto is good too. This avocado sauce was nice too.
I think everyone is getting cabbage this week so I hope some of you try this.
Pancakes
1/2 small head cabbage, very thinly sliced (1 pound or 5 to 6 cups shreds) which will be easiest on a mandoline if you have one
4 medium carrots, peeled into ribbons with a vegetable peeler
5 lacinato kale leaves, ribs removed, leaves cut into thin ribbons
4 scallions, thinly sliced on an angle
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
6 large eggs, lightly beaten
Canola, safflower or peanut oil for frying
Make the pancakes: Toss cabbage, carrot, kale, scallions and salt together in a large bowl. Toss mixture with flour so it coats all of the vegetables. Stir in the eggs. Heat a large heavy skillet on medium-high heat. Coat the bottom with oil and heat that too.
To make a large pancake, add 1/4 of the vegetable mixture to the skillet, pressing it out into a 1/2- to 3/4-inch pancake. Gently press the pancake down flat. Cook until the edges beging to brown, about 3 minutes. 30 seconds to 1 minute later, flip the pancake with a large spatula. (If this is terrifying, you can first slide the pancake onto a plate, and, using potholders, reverse it back into the hot skillet.) Cook on the other side until the edges brown, and then again up to a minute more (you can peek to make sure the color is right underneath).
To make small pancakes, you can use tongs but I seriously find using my fingers and grabbing little piles, letting a little batter drip back into the bowl, and depositing them in piles on the skillet easier, to form 3 to 4 pancakes. Press down gently with a spatula to they flatten slightly, but no need to spread them much. Cook for 3 minutes, or until the edges brown. Flip the pancakes and cook them again until brown underneath.
Regardless of pancake size, you can keep them warm on a tray in the oven at 200 to 250 degrees until needed.
We are excited to welcome you to our third Winter CSA! Like many things, our Winter CSA was born out of a “pivot” due to Covid. In 2020 we decided not to have our fall farm stand/pumpkin patch so we had a lot of vegetables at the end of the season but we weren’t sure where to go with them. We decided to give a Winter CSA a try and it was great! It was a way for us to stay in touch with some of our regular CSA members at a time of year when the farm moves at a more relaxed pace. And our members were so excited to be able to continue getting fresh vegetables when most farm fields are hibernating for the winter.
This season has felt like a blur! This is a snowy photo from March, way back when we first leased the Thomas Open Space Farm in Lafayette. It’s hard to believe that was just this past spring. It was a much bigger challenge than we expected to move a large part of our operation to a new location. (But of course it was more than we expected! Isn’t that just the way these things go?) Now we have one season under our belts, an incredibly welcoming community in Lafayette, and a huge amount of support from the City of Lafayette Open Space staff. It feels a lot less overwhelming to think about next season now that we’ve been through this year and have an idea of how this new farm works instead of just a bunch of dreams about the future.
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