Delicious, Nostalgic Red Cabbage Rolls

About 4 or 5 years ago at my best friends house, her mother (who is an incredible cook as it is) served me red cabbage rolls. But instead of the mushy, tomato-sauce drowned rolls I'd had at Middle Eastern restaurants in the past - these rolls were heavenly. The cabbage was still firm, the beef exquisite. There were fresh vegetables and a slightly sweet taste. They were delicious.

Now, while this is a variation of her original recipe, it is still just as good.

Red Cabbage Rolls

You Will Need:

• 1 head red cabbage
• 2 lbs ground beef
• 2 (red, yellow or white) regular onions (or 1/4 cup onion powder), diced
• 4 garlic cloves, minced
• 1/4 cup fresh/canned/dried mushrooms, diced
• 1 tbsp Worcestershire Sauce
• 1 cup white rice
• 1 6oz can tomato paste
• 1 diced tomato
• 2 eggs
• 1 tbsp paprika 
• 4 tbsp salt
• 1 tsp pepper
• 1 tbsp Italian seasoning blend (or 1 tbsp worth of basil, oregano and thyme)
• Bacon grease for greasing the pan (if you don't have any, shortening will work)

If your ground beef is frozen, make sure it is completely defrosted before starting.

Fill a large soup pot with water and some salt. Heat to boiling, and add the whole cabbage. Parboil for about 5 minutes. Do not over boil, your leaves will disintegrate. Carefully remove the cabbage head from the boiling water - do not drain. Cut off the flexible leaves at the base, one by one, pealing the thick stem off for easier rolling. Be careful to keep the leaves whole. Set them aside. 

When you reach the stiff inner leaves, return the cabbage head to the pot and boil for another 5 minutes. Remove again, do not drain, and peel off the remaining leaves. 

In a small pot, combine 1 cup of dry white rice and 1 cup of water. Add a dash of salt. Bring to a boil, reduce heat to low, and cover. Let simmer until water is completely absorbed, approximately 8 minutes. Remove from heat and set aside to cool.

In a large mixing bowl, combine ground beef, onion, garlic, mushroom, Worcetershire, cooled rice, tomato paste, tomato, eggs, paprika, salt, pepper and Italian seasoning. The best mixing is done with bare hands, but if you don't like that a wooden spoon works adequately. 

When everything is thoroughly mixed, take 1 large 13x9 inch glass baking pan. Grease with the bacon grease, thoroughly.

Preheat the oven to 350 F.

Take your cabbage leaves, and fill them with the hamburger mixture, rolling them. Place them in your greased glass baking pan. When done, pour 1 cup of the reserved cabbage boiling water in, then cover with tinfoil.

Bake for 1 hour. Then, remove the tinfoil and bake for another 20 minutes. There will still be some fluid left in the pan.

These are best served with mashed potatoes and mushroom gravy, but I like them with ketchup.

Enjoy. )

Important Note: DO NOT put more water in your glass pan. It will shatter. Once the initial water is added, while your glass pan is still cool, do not add more. Ever.

Vegan Ratatouille

For health reasons, I've had to go almost entirely vegan. The only animal products I can consume are egg, in minute amounts, and honey. Because of this I've begun to explore a lot of the foods in the vegan and raw world, as I transition to a diet that is gentler on my body.

One of my favorite French foods is ratatouille. And since it's in season, I made it last night and let me say, it was phenomenal. So delicious. Serve this with some rustic French or Italian bread, or over mashed potatoes.

Serves 8.

You Will Need:

• 1 small eggplant, sliced in half lengthwise, unpeeled
• 1 small yellow onion, thinly sliced and seperated into rings
• Olive oil
• 8 garlic cloves, minced
• 2 small red or yellow bell peppers, thinly sliced
• 1 large zuchini, cubed or cut into thin sticks
• 1 14 oz can of whole tomatoes with juice
• 1/2 can garbanzo beans, drained and rinsed
• 3-4 fresh sprigs of thyme or 1/2 tsp dried
• 2 tbsp salt
• 1/2 tbsp ground pepper
• 1 cup vegetable broth

Preheat oven to 350 F. Score the inside of each half of the eggplant and brush with olive oil. Place eggplant skin-side up on a greased cookie sheet and bake for 20 to 30 minutes, until skin is shrivelled.

While eggplant is baking, in a large pot add about a tbsp of olive oil and heat over medium heat. Once oil is heated, add onion and saute until translucent. Add garlic, and saute for 1 minute. Then add bell pepper and zuchini. Cook, stirring occassionally, until vegetables have begun to soften (about 10 minutes).

When the eggplant is ready, take it out of the oven and let cool. Once it's cool enough to cut, cut it into bite-size pieces. Add the eggplant to the pot. Stir.

In can, chop up tomatoes into reasonable pieces. Pour, juice and all into the pot. Add garbanzo beans, salt, pepper and thyme. Cook, stirring occasionally for about five minutes.

Add vegetable broth. Stir. Cover and let cook (still at medium heat), for about 20 minutes. Or until you can't stand to wait any longer. Either works.

Serve and enjoy. :) I garuntee it will be one of the most incredibly delicious healthy, seasonal foods you have ever eaten.

This recipe was adapted from the Students Go Vegan Cookbook by Carole Raymond.

Healing Rituals

My father was violent, he was mean. He abused my mother on a regular basis, and it wasn't until just two years ago that she finally escaped. When she left, she fled to a Woman's Shelter. We stayed there for almost two months with several other woman and families.

And despite the fact that me, my two younger siblings and my mother shared a small 12x12 bedroom, and all the other complications of familial community living, and the pain that all of us were dealing with there, it was also one of the best, most positive experiences of my life.

I've moved 21 times, and in a few months it will be 22. And out of all of those places, that shelter is my favorite. And it's not for any reasons like I liked the paint colors or the tv was nice, it's because of the memories, the feelings, the people.

For people like me who have gone through a traumatic situation, whether it was only a few moments or several years, healing is essential. Not only is it essential, but it's hard, difficult, arduous. It's a long, up-hill climb. Sometimes it feels like you will never fully recover.

That shelter healed me, in so many ways. And I felt it would be important to talk about how it healed me. So that you, or someone you love, can heal too.

1. My "home base" was full of people who didn't judge me, or each other. No matter how hard the real world got, I could fall back to Home Base and recover.
2. I had proof of peoples love for me. When I got sick, someone bought me popsicles. When I was scared, someone talked to me. I was hugged, kissed, touched and generally loved. There were what I call Spontaneous Expressions of Love in which I was surprised with gifts, trips to the movies, and cooking lessons.
3. "Be still and know that I am God." Every morning, all the woman and I would get up early before the small children, go out and sit on the back porch and drink coffee in the silence. We would watch the sun rise, listen to the birds, smell the wind blowing through the pine trees as we cuddled up in our fluffy blankets and just breathed. Like meditation, but not quite. It was just existing in only that moment, in the silence, being completely still.
4. We took care of each other, and we took that job of caretaker seriously. No one flaked out on cooking dinner. The toilet was always clean. We could depend on our needs being met. There was no fear of being abandoned, even such a small way.
5. We ate dinner together. Every single night, no matter what. We never missed a night.
6. We supported eachother. In some cases, it was through formal support groups. But in others, it was more casual, but much more meaningful. It was talking about our dreams and our hopes. Giving each other advice, and holding each other while we cried.
7. We focused on filling our lives with happiness. We followed our dreams, stopped caring what other people thought, and were let free. We were all given freedom for the first time, and we took advantage of it.
8. We had coffee. Everyday started with the most simple ritual, but it was something we all clung too and took comfort in because it made us feel better. And it was important to start every day off with something that made us feel good.
9. We ate good food. We ate to feel good, instead of look good. Which means while we never pigged out on junk food, we weren't obsessing over low-fat milk. We ate real, whole foods like berries. We ate warm comfort foods like homemade mexican soups and stews that I don't even know the name of, mac and cheese from scratch and fresh-baked bread.

While some of this you may not find applicable to your life, I hope at least some of it will be.

How do you heal?