Slow cooking: cabbage revisited, and how to modify a dish

Well, THAT title sounds intimidating doesn't it? Well, fear not. It is not nearly as bad as it sounds, it is simply, well, "informative," if you will.
I bet that I can tell who's going to put his or her hand up when I ask: how many people like cabbage? because I've done this before. Not a whole lot of you, huh? And a few saying "well, in coleslaw, sure, but not cooked."
I betcha you are all veterans of the stinky , smelly, overcooked cabbage we had as kids. YOu remember: coming home, smelling that STINK and thinking "please don't let it be our house, please don't let it be our house," walking in the door and... OH NO. Mom is making corned beef and cabbage tonight. Then, that stinking, wet, hot, bland wedge went on your plate with an explanation like "OH COME ON. You like it in coleslaw," when really, all you wanted was the mayonnaise.
As with so many things, ragazzi, it is in the cooking. Annalena LOVES cabbage. She wants you to love cabbage too. And so, she's giving you a recipe that is an adaptation of a recipe she found in that new book by Amanda Hesser that she wrote about, a few blogs ago.

This recipe, when you go through it, tells you that its origins are southwestern France, or perhaps the bordering region of Germany. It's Alsatian, all the way, with the cabbage, the mix of sweet and sour (which is optional), the chestnuts, the pork, and the red cabbage - which, incidentally, is called blue cabbage (blaukraut) in Germany.

Don't ask. I never do.

Well, the recipe was for red cabbage. Annalena prefers savoy cabbage, and that is what is called for here. Use red if you like. Use the plain one if you like, but honestly, the savoy cabbage - the crinkly one - is better. Here we go.

There's a bit of prep work involved, so do that first. You need 4-6 ounces of bacon, cut into small dice. (Leave this out if you want to go vegetarian). Also, one onion, also diced. Then, remember those chestnuts Annalena told you about? The vacuum bag of them? Get one of them, and just break the guys up roughly. Get three medium sized apples (a pound or so, and try to go for the tart/sweet varieties), and peel them and slice them. Pour out a cup of a white wine. To be truly authentic, go for gewurztraminer or rielsing, but if you happen to have a started bottle of something, use that, as long as it's not too sweet.

Finally, your cabbage. Pull off the outer leaves, and then cut the head in quarters. Cut out the core, and then use a sharp knife to shred it. Just slice down into ribbons. You'll have a lot of it, so... get a big pot ready.

Put a tablespoon or so of olive oil in it, and add the bacon. Cook it at medium heat, and while that's going, start preheating your oven to 450. Adjust the racks so that your pot will fit in there. Keep an eye on the bacon, and when you see that the fat is leaving, and the meat is beginning to darken a bit, add the onions. Stir this together, and cook for a minute or so, until the onion goes translucent. It won't take long.

Now, add the apples, and then the wine. Bring this all to a boil, which will happen almost instantaneously. Add half the cabbage, and all the chestnuts. IF you like it (and I do), add a big tablespoon of caraway seeds. Add some salt and pepper, and then the rest of the cabbage. Cover the pot, lower the heat, and let this cook for ten minutes.

When the ten minutes have passed, put the whole pot in the oven, and bake for 30 minutes. Then, take a peek inside. Really reduced, huh? It may even be a little dry and the cabbage may be sticking. If that's true, add about a third cup more wine. Then reduce the heat to 375, and cook for another hour.

You're braising cabbage for nearly two hours, with lots of aromatics. When it's done, you'll have lovely brown bits, and not nearly as much cabbage as you started with. Taste it. If you want to be authentic, at this point you add a sweetner, like brown sugar or honey, and then some vinegar. My taste runs to only adding vinegar, and I use apple cider vinegar, for reasons I think you'll all understand.

This keeps beautifully, and it's a wonderful side dish with some of the more intensely flavored meats, or even with fish, like seared monkfish.

I would bet that if you made this, you will become a fan of cabbage. So, give it a try. Cabbage is good for you, and there's wine in the dish. Now, what could be wrong about that?