Thursday, January 14, 2010

Bring it on

My friend and I are both ecstatic about cooking and eating delicious meals. We prefer home cooked meals, but we do like to go out for lunch once in a while.
I was thinking of a dish she has made for me on several occasions: golabki. Don't ask me to pronounce the word, because I suck. I have pretty good language skills, but Polish is not one of them. There are some words I can pronounce, but most of these are not meant to say on the Internet.

So golabki. Stuffed cabbage rolls. I prefer golabki, because the English translation does not sound as appetising as the Polish word. Go-lab-ki. It takes a whole lot of work to cook them, but they are definitely worth it. I remember I hesitated to taste them at first, since I'm not a huge cabbage lover (I do love red cabbage though), but my friend convinced me to have some. And I must say: it's delicious! The cabbage leaves are cooked, one at a time, before you stuff them with a moist filling of minced meat, rice, tomatoes and spices like juniper and grounded bayleaf. Once all of the leaves have their filling, you arrange them side by side in an oven dish. You make a fresh tomato sauce to cover them and then you bake this delicacy in the oven.

I prefer to have them cold, right out of the fridge. It's probably the smell of warm cabbage that is not very appealing to me. But that doesn't matter. I eat mine cold.
Once in a while, my friend makes this dish for my family. Hubby loves the way she makes golabki. I can never mimic her. Mine will always be a little different and have a more Flemish touch to them. But that's okay. It's some sort of comfort food. And it reminds me of my good friend..


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