I’m getting ready to do my Thanksgiving grocery shopping and our refrigerator needs some help. I found what I thought was a lime in my crisper drawer, but it was actually a head of iceberg lettuce from 2012. No, not really, but the “wispy fingers” my friend Liz and I used to joke were coming to get us from the inner sanctum of the fridge are threatening, so it’s time to clean it out and make room for the turkey day goodies. The overflow will go into the beer fridge in the basement.

Best way to clean out and use up what needs to go? Soup! My Portuguese kale soup is a good lunch treat, and I had all the stuff, so that was a no brainer. I also had the stuff for Weight Watchers vegetable soup, but I just couldn’t do another batch right now. The head of cabbage I bought for that purpose needed to go somewhere, and I remembered a recipe on Tasting Table, a blog I read almost daily. It was for Holubtsi, Ukrainian stuffed cabbage, but I guess I should be careful making Eastern European foods. I might get deported. I’m going for it anyway. The only substitutes I’d need to make with what was in the fridge were ground turkey instead of beef and pork, and raisins instead of barberries. I was fresh out of barberries. Where on God’s earth do you buy barberries? Anyway, raisins are an acceptable substitute so I went for it.

This recipe has a few steps, none of which are complicated, and it can be made in the slow cooker, which is always a plus. It calls for Savoy cabbage, but all I had was plain old green, so the rolls are a bit smaller. No biggie. Pun intended.

Slow Cooker Holubtsi

Put these ingredients in the bottom of the slow cooker:

½ medium onion, chopped

1 large carrot, grated

2 T. olive oil

2 tsp. sugar

1 T. tomato paste

1 – 14 ½ oz. can diced tomatoes

1 cup water

2 bay leaves

Salt and pepper to taste

Stir all ingredients together.

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Next:

Par boil ¼ cup of white rice and 1/3 c. raisins in water for 5 minutes and drain.

Boil a large pot of water and prepare an ice bath (ice cubes and water) in a large bowl. Separate the leaves from the head of cabbage. Drop the leaves a few at a time into the boiling water for 1-2 minutes, transfer to the ice bath to cool and then place on a paper towel-lined baking sheet to drain.

Mix together 16 oz. ground turkey, the par boiled rice and raisins, and 1 ¼ tsp. kosher salt. Mix together with your hands.

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Place a cabbage leaf with the stem end facing you. Put 2 T. of filling on the cabbage leaf, tuck the sides over the filling and roll the cabbage away from you, placing the roll with the seam side down. Continue until the filling is used up. Nestle the rolls in the slow cooker atop the tomato mixture. Cover and cook on high for 2 ½ hours.

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Serve topped with chopped dill and sour cream.

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For the stovetop recipe with the original ingredients (yes, including the barberries) click here. For the video of the slow cooker version click here.

Enjoy! And wish me luck cleaning the fridge.

Deborah