Braised sauerkraut: how to cook, a variety of options for dishes

Braised sauerkraut is considered one of the traditional side dishes in our country.It has an original sour taste, goes well with any kind of meat and is easy to prepare. Cabbage is used both as a side dish and as a separate vegetable dish. The latter is particularly pleasing to the devotees of healthy food and vegetarians.

Stewed sauerkraut can be found on the dinner table of families of many countries - Russians, Germans, Ukrainians, Czechs and Poles prefer this unpretentious dish. Of course, the inhabitants of each country, and sometimes cities, add a certain "zest" to the main recipe. For example, in Germany it is customary to combine this side dish with pork roast knuckle, and in Poland - with different types of meat. The inhabitants of the Czech Republic are used to cooking vegetables with the addition of prunes and a variety of spices, and in Ukraine it is great to combine it with sour cream. It is worth adding that in Polish cuisine the dish was named bigos, the usual Russian fish soup.

Braised sauerkraut, regardless of the method of preparation, always turns out tasty and healthy. The abundance of vitamins contained in it especially helps out in the winter season. Finally, it prepares quickly and is one of the most affordable products, so anyone with any income level can afford to stew cabbage.

It is worth adding that this dish is also low-calorie. If you take its simplest variety, consisting of cabbage itself, onions, carrots, tomato paste, vegetable oil and spices, then the nutritional value of 100 grams will be only 30.4 kilocalories. Considering that a typical serving contains just over 200 grams, then the calorie content of a lunch or dinner will be 65.9 kilocalories, which is a very small figure. Cabbage contains enough fiber - an extremely useful substance that removes toxins, slags and other substances it does not need from the body.

Braised cabbage is combined with almost anything: with various types of meat, potatoes or mushrooms. It can be cooked with sausages or sausages, and then you’ll have a traditional Soviet delicacy, familiar to many from early childhood. In addition, you can separately extinguish sauerkraut, separately fresh, and then mix the two varieties of this vegetable - it will turn out unbanal and extremely appetizing.

When the dish is cooked in the post, it is usually stewed in water and with a minimum amount of spices. If you need a brighter, festive taste, then you can experiment with seasonings, and add different sauces - anything, depending on taste preferences and fantasy.

Cabbage can even be put out on lard. The meat is cut in small sizes and melted in a pan, and you need to achieve "transparency", then zazharka is added and then everything is prepared according to the usual algorithm.

Cabbage, cooked according to the simplest recipe, turns out to be quite unusual - its taste is slightly spicy and even sour, which is a consequence of fermentation. But if you combine it with a traditional roast, consisting of carrots, onions and tomato paste, then the situation will be balanced.

There is an impressive array of variations in stewed sauerkraut cooking.They differ not only in countries and smaller settlements, but even in households - almost every hostess has their own methods.

For the traditional and the simplest cooking stewed sauerkraut in a saucepan, you will need sour cabbage, a couple of bulbs, a couple of carrots, tomato paste, salt and sugar, spices, sunflower oil and boiling water, which can be replaced with meat or vegetable broth. The cabbage is squeezed, if necessary, cut and sent to the pan, in which the oil is already heated. Everything is poured with broth, the lid is closed, and the middle fire is turned on.

Onions and carrots are finely chopped (carrots can be grated) and fried in a pan over medium heat until golden brown. Tomato paste and spices are also sent there, and everything stands on the fire for about 5 minutes. 10 minutes before the end of stewing cabbage, ready zazharka is put in the pan. Together they will have to stew for 10 minutes, and at this point you need to add bay leaf.

Optionally, you can also fry a little flour in the oil, and then add it to the cabbage. Everything is mixed, the first sample occurs and, if necessary, it is salted, paprika or sugared. The cabbage has to stand without a lid for another couple of minutes, and after the fire can be turned off. Ready vegetables are laid out on plates, decorated with fresh greens and served on the table.

If there is a supply of sausages in the refrigerator, then they can diversify a vegetable dish - it will be very tasty. The method of preparation is similar, but for convenience, you can stew zazharku from onions, carrots and tomato paste and cabbage itself in the same container. To do this, pour oil into the pan and the onion begins to fry. As soon as it becomes golden, cabbage is placed there. Everything is mixed and left alone for approximately 15 minutes. Then add spices, tomato paste, and the lid closes again. Meanwhile, sausages are cut in circles and fried in another pan until golden brown. 5 minutes before the end of stewing cabbage, they go to her and mix. At will the delicacy is served with mashed potatoes.

Some people prefer to combine stewed sauerkraut with mushrooms and sour cream. The latter can be any, but ideally - forest. First, cut mushrooms are sent to the pan, which are fried for 3 minutes, and then stewed under a lid for 5 minutes. In the next step, onions are mixed into the same pan. Almost immediately goes there and cabbage. All sprinkled with spices and soy sauce. The mixture is fried without a lid for a couple of minutes, and then supplemented with sour cream. Everything is again mixed and covered with a frying pan. Stew the dish to be about half an hour. Approaching the end of cooking, you can add fresh herbs.

The cabbage recipe in Czech looks very curious. This original dish will require cabbage, apples, prunes, butter, onions, sugar and various spices: anise, cloves, red and black pepper and others. Prunes must first be washed and kept in water for 30 minutes. At this time, you can peel and chop the onion and fry it in butter. After the cabbage with sugar is added to the onions, everything is filled with water and sent to stew over low heat.

At the next stage, which occurs after 30 minutes, prunes are added to the dish, and after another 20 - apples, which are already cut into strips, and spices to taste.

Braised sauerkraut with potatoes is often prepared as a side dish for something meat. During the post it can be used as a separate dish.For cooking, you need to cook sauerkraut, a few potatoes, traditional carrots with onions, butter, on which everything will be fried, sugar, salt and spices. Potatoes are pre-cooked in uniform. Then the peel is removed, and the vegetable is cut into small cubes or as sticks of medium thickness. Onions and carrots are peeled, onions are finely chopped, and carrots are rubbed on a grater.

The oil is heated on the fire to boil, onions and carrots are sent there. The roast is cooked for five minutes, until the onion is golden. Sour cabbage is washed and mixed with vegetables in a griddle. Fry everything together for 10 or 15 minutes. Already sliced ​​potatoes are added to the mixture. Everything is sprinkled with spices and sugar, mixed and stewed for 10 minutes.

You can also add bay leaf with potatoes in the dish, and at the last stage, when it is time to spice up, pour with ketchup or tomato paste. Everything is decorated with usually fresh greens.

Braised sauerkraut in German is usually prepared with meat: minced meat, goulash, traditional pork knuckles or other varieties. It is very easy to adapt and repeat a foreign recipe at home. To prepare such a delicacy, you will need cabbage, meat (any will be suitable, no matter if it is pork, beef or lamb), onions, tomato paste, sugar, spices, vegetable oil and other traditional ingredients.

The meat is coarsely chopped and fried with onion half rings for 10 minutes. After the cabbage is added, everything is filled with hot water, mixed and stewed for an hour. In this case, instead of water, broth will go well, for example, meat. Then tomato paste is added and everything else is mixed and stewed for half an hour.

If there is a desire to cook an original German dish, then you need to do the following: purchase sauerkraut without carrots, bacon, olive or vegetable oil, 2 onions, an apple, cumin and juniper berries. Cabbage is freed from brine and, if necessary, washed. Fat is cut into strips, onion in half rings, and both ingredients are sent to the pan, which already boils oil. Products are fried until a delicate "caramel" color appears. Cabbage combined with spices and mixed. For 10 minutes, it is on fire, and then you can fill it up with water. Quenching continues for 15 minutes. Finally, at the end there comes a time for apple slices and berries, with which pork fat and cabbage will languish for 10 minutes. This garnish is complemented with traditional sausages.

There is another unusual cabbage recipe in German. First of all, sour cabbage with cranberries, mutton or lard fat, blue onions, fresh apple juice, blue plums or cherry plums, juniper fruits, small apples and spices are purchased. By the time it takes about an hour to prepare such a seemingly large-scale dish. Fat is melted, in which cabbage and onions are laid out. The plums are peeled, then the bones are removed and the fruit is rubbed on a sieve. Apple to grate. Ready fruit is also added to the container on the plate. Together they will have to fry for 10 minutes, after which the apple juice will be poured. The quenching continues until the cabbage becomes medium soft - it is necessary to determine the taste.

Meat lovers will love the vegetables cooked with chicken. This delicacy simply prepares, and all its components are rather accessible. The composition of the dish is standard, the only innovations are chicken fillet and garlic. Films and leather are removed from the bird, then the piece is rinsed under water and dried with a napkin.Then the fillet is cut in small pieces and fried in butter.

Cook vegetables and pork. In addition to the usual ingredients, the composition includes garlic, pork and bay leaf. After processing the cabbage from salt, the meat is cut into small cubes or strips. Butter is heated in a skillet, pork and spices are placed there, and all this is stewed for 20 minutes under a lid.

Then onions are added to the mixture - this time it is cut into cubes, and another 15 minutes of heat treatment takes place. Finally, cabbage is loaded into the container and poured with tomato paste. Spices, bay leaves, sugar are added and cut off for 30 minutes. After that, it remains to add fresh parsley and dill, garlic and in 10 minutes call everyone to the table.

We should also tell about the traditional Polish dish called bigos, which consists of stewed sauerkraut and meat. According to the rules, you need to cook it for three days and stew the ingredients for 1.5 hours a day - this is the only way to achieve an unforgettable taste and smell. Pork is traditionally chosen for bigos, although it is possible to experiment with other types of meat, as well as smoked meats. Then you will need melted fat for roasting, onions, a few tablespoons of rice, sauerkraut, sour cream, garlic, fresh dill and parsley and, of course, various spices.

Pork for softness will have to be processed in a meat grinder. Preliminary work is carried out with rice - it is cleared of debris and spoiled grains, washed under water and drained. The onion is peeled, then cut into small pieces and fried along with the rice until the latter is golden brown. After all, it is poured with water or meat broth, covered with a lid and sent to stew until fully cooked.

At the next stage, it is necessary to mix the already cooled rice with ground meat, eggs and spices, for example, black pepper and coriander. At this time, another onion is fried in fat, also finely chopped, mixed with sauerkraut, sprinkled with spices and sent to the fire. Meatballs form meatballs with rice and are placed in cabbage - they should be stewed in a westa. The balls must be turned over periodically, but this must be done carefully, as they may fall apart.

When the dish is ready, it is supplemented with sour cream and garlic, passed through a press and mixed with salt. Serve it is recommended hot and sprinkled with fresh herbs.

Today, when most people need to save time, recipes for multicookers are becoming relevant. There is such a stew for sauerkraut. For culinary creativity it is necessary to prepare cabbage, chicken fillet, smoked sausage, tomato paste and / or tomatoes, onions, water and vegetable oil.

Fillet is processed properly: washed, dried and cut into pieces. Vegetables are also prepared: onions are peeled and cut into half rings, and tomatoes are cut into slices. In the slow cooker, the “Baking” mode is selected, vegetable oil is poured into it and the onion is fried. After chicken, tomatoes are added, and processing continues. After put sauerkraut, tomato paste, smoked sausage and all is well mixed. Finally, it is necessary to fill the mixture with water and change the mode to “Pilaf”. Exhibited time is 1.5 hours, and after a specified period the dish can be served.

You can cook this dish in other modes, for example, “Quenching” (takes only 40 minutes) or “Buckwheat”.

The slow cooker is a very convenient unit, where you can quickly cook familiar dishes and get unexpected results. This can be said about the stewed cabbage with sausage. For the preparation of this Soviet dish with a modern touch you will need sauerkraut, sausages (creamy, with cheese or others cooking), onion heads, cooking oil, fresh herbs (basil, dill, parsley), spices, sugar and salt. By the time the food will be cooked for about an hour.

First of all, the excessive acidity of cabbage is eliminated - it is washed under cold water. Next in a skillet with a thick bottom, preferably made of cast iron, sausages are fried to a light golden hue. After they go along with the cabbage in a slow cooker. Onion is peeled, cut into small cubes and also goes inside the device. The machine includes in the "Baking" mode for 20 minutes. After the allotted time, you should open the lid, put salt and spices inside, mix everything up and continue cooking in the “Quenching” mode. The last phase should also last 20 minutes. Finally, after turning off the multicooker, the dish is sprinkled with dill, parsley and basil and served on the table.

If there is no multicooker, but there is a desire to cook stewed sauerkraut somehow differently, then you can use the oven. In it the delicacy is less calorie, less effort is needed, but to get the same qualitative result. In the oven, cabbage is to be cooked in a clay or ceramic container that has high sides.

At the bottom of the tank send pre-peeled and chopped onions and carrots. Then the cabbage washed from the brine combines with them. Everything is mixed and supplemented with tomato paste or ketchup, a small piece of butter (in principle, suitable and vegetable) and spices. Cumin is a spicy addition, for example. Finally, everything is filled with water, and the vegetables should not remain on the surface, tightly closed with a lid and placed in the oven.

Pre-oven should be heated to 180 degrees. An hour later, ready-made delicacy can be obtained and entertain your loved ones.

For the long time of existence of this dish, housewives have accumulated a sufficient amount of useful tips to help prepare vegetables in the best possible way. Here are some of them:

• Before stewing sauerkraut, be sure to taste it to determine the level of acidity. If the taste is sharp and the acid needs to be removed, then the vegetable will have to be rinsed under cold water. In the case when this method does not help, you have to boil the vegetable in ordinary water for 10 to 15 minutes. If the acid is acceptable, then simply flip the cabbage into a colander to stack the entire brine.
• If the product is sour in large pieces or whole, then to extinguish it is recommended to cut it into smaller ones, which are conveniently taken with a fork.
• Before cooking, sour cabbage is necessarily pressed from the juice.
• Very often, this vegetable is sour with berries or vegetables, such as carrots, so it is not necessary to “duplicate” vegetables for stewing. If the cabbage is “clean,” it is always customary to add a couple of carrots and bulbs, roasted over low heat for 5 minutes.

• Peroxide sauerkraut reanimates a couple of minutes spent in boiling water.
• During cooking, to avoid burning, it is necessary to periodically add liquid. This can be either plain water or tomato juice. In addition, a side effect of this will be the increased juiciness of the vegetable.
• To “balance” the sourness, you can add a little sugar - one spoon.
• Experiments with spices, both with classical (a carnation, caraway, red pepper), and unusual (a turmeric, a coriander) are welcomed.
• Tenderness dish will add quenching in cream or sour cream.
• If you “flourish” the cabbage with flour, the taste will become more “deep” and the dish will be thicker.
• The dish will require either a pot with thick walls or a cauldron for pilaf. So the content does not burn, but it will turn out tasty and fragrant.

• For traditional zazharki tomato paste is usually chosen. However, an equivalent substitute will be tomato sauce, and even ketchup, approximately 100 grams. It would also be correct to use fresh or canned tomatoes, scalding them, removing the peel and cutting into small cubes.
• If cabbage is cooked with fatty meat, then adding cumin will be a good idea.
• In no case can you cook the dish in a pan made of aluminum. This metal in an acidic environment, which creates cabbage, will begin to produce hazardous compounds.
• The larger the cut vegetables, the less vitamins and nutrients they lose in the process of extinguishing.
• Water cabbage is always poured so that it hides it.

See below for one of the recipes for making sauerkraut stew.