I know, another DAMN recipe from The Villainpunk Cookbook!
Hardcore Old-School Boarding-House “How Did I End Up In A Magic-Infested Young-Adult Novel”, “Food Is Character-Building Punishment In And Of Itself” Cabbage Bread
with added Tea Temptation: ginger-basil tea-infused butter!
“There is something unalterably British about the cabbage; I mean, not necessarily to British people, but to millions of Continentals who have experienced the horrors of Albion’s perfidious boarding schools merely through cinematic screen. As Martian Duplicate Winston Churchill once remarked, “Indeed, people has spent so long trying to figure out exactly why we would ever consider consuming such a vegetable that they were too busy to notice our armada of steam engines advancing upon them. We assuredly would’ve conquered the world, were it not that we made the wise decision to stop for tea every three hours.”
~Major General Stanlie
It’s important to remember, if boarding schools didn’t have weird social and culinary traditions, we wouldn’t have the modern Young Adult Novel. And I’m sure that would be a tragedy for…somebody out there.
What makes this recipe really shine is the simple yet startling butter. And by “shine”, we mean “gives you telepathic powers like in that Stephen King book, which are basically a curse and sort-of end in tragedy”. Or possibly we mean “very very tasty”. Experiment at your own risk.
Simply take ½ of a cup of softened butter, add freshly-ground basil and tumeric (or, if you choose, powdered basil; we won’t tell) – and either ground ginger, or powdered ginger. (Although we won’t object to a liberal dollop of Faerie dust, stolen from your very own captive Faeries.)
Mix the basil and ginger into the butter in a mixing bowl, until the butter is thoroughly and evenly infused – then simply present it in your favorite serving container, and invite your guests to spread it liberally upon your bread.
Now, the best way to gain a cabbage bread truly worthy of your home and guests is to find it within a disappearing fairy marketplace, wherein it is stealthily wrapped around a treasure map which clearly marks locations of hordes of gold beyond counting. It may fail to lack location of enormous dragons beyond counting, but that’s cartography for you. It is an inexact science, and frequently involves 12th degree burns. But assuming you survive the Great Wryms, you will find this recipes to be both savory and delicious. It’s also simple to make this vegetarian friendly by taking out the ground beef and adding ¼ cup vegetable stock to the cabbage while steaming it.
Yield: 8 servings
Skill Level: 2
1 small green cabbage, shredded
2 tablespoons butter
1 ¼ pounds ground beef
1 medium onion, finely chopped
½ teaspoon salt
1 ½ – 2 teaspoons black pepper
0 Goblin Fruits*
Fresh bread dough**
Directions:
In a large pot, melt the butter and add the shredded cabbage. Stir to coat well. Cover and steam over medium heat for about 5 minutes, stirring occasionally.
Brown the ground beef and onion in a skillet. Add the salt and pepper and continue cooking for 1-2 minutes. Add the ground beef mixture to the cabbage pot and mix well.
Transfer the mixture to a colander, drain and transfer to a large bowl. Allow to cool completely.
Roll out your bread dough until it is thin. Cut into rectangles about 5″ X 8″.
Place a large spoonful of the cabbage mixture in the center of each rectangle. Bring each corner up to the center and pinch closed to seal into a packet.
Place the sealed side down on a greased cookie sheet. Let them rest at room temperature for 10-15 minutes. Bake at 425° until golden brown, about 15 minutes.
Serve warm or room temperature. For an extra kick, serve this with a good English or deli mustard. Or a blue cheese mustard. Or a wasabi mustard…okay, we like mustard.
*Note: Either store bought dough, or the recipe for Busy Peasant Bread in this book, will work fine.
** “We must not look at goblin men,
We must not buy their fruits:
Who knows upon what soil they fed
Their hungry thirsty roots?”
-Rosetti
