How’s your quarantine life going?

I imagine the GS and I are having an easier time than most, given that we’ve been working from home together for about 4 years and I’ve been on maternity leave so staying in and snuggling Greta and Louise has been my MO for a while now. We’ve got this down.

The main difference, aside from the fact that I am actually working now for much of the day, is that I no longer have my escape to the gym/yoga studio. Fortunately there’s a lot of good fitness content online. My favorites obviously include Les Mills on Demand (currently free for everyone- get your Body Attack on), but also one of my fav yoga instructors has been posting on Instagram live MWF at noon. She’s @daniyarussoreidy if you want to follow and get your ass kicked on the mat.

In an effort to avoid the grocery store at all costs, the GS did a BJs run to stock up on some bulk essentials, and then we’ve been frequenting our two local small grocers: DiPasquale’s Italian Marketplace, and Rooftop Hot. On Sunday we ordered a CSA box from Rooftop, as well as some local organic meat! It was like my own version of Chopped.

We got this cabbage in the box. I’m still not exactly sure what variety it is, but I decided to stuff it!

Stuffed Cabbage Rolls

8 large cabbage leaves

1 lb ground meat (we got veal)

1 cup cooked rice

1 egg

1 onion, finely diced

3-4 cloves garlic, minced

1 tbs dried oregano

1/2 tsp crushed red pepper flakes

tomato sauce

Combine the meat, rice, egg, onion, garlic, and seasonings. Add a bunch of salt and pepper. This would be a great use for leftover rice- if you do make it fresh just let it cool before you add it to the meat!

Boil some water and blanch the cabbage leaves for 2 minutes or so until they get bright green. This will make them more pliable. You may have to cut off the stem area a bit to make them easier to roll.

Pour some sauce in the bottom of a baking dish. Again, great use for leftover sauce. I used jarred sauce because I had it, but if you feel like making it this one or this one would be good!

Spoon some of the meat/rice mixture in the middle of a cabbage leaf, then roll it up. Place it in the baking sheet, seam side down.

Pour some more sauce over the top, then cover with foil. Bake at 375 for an hour. Sprinkle with some freshly grated parm!

These were actually incredible. Way better than I expected them to be. The GS said they could be on a restaurant menu.

We recommend enjoying them over a competitive game of Scrabble. So glad we invested in the deluxe version a few years ago.