Polish Kapusta (Cabbage) and Breaded Chicken Patties

Yesterday, I made my mom’s super delicious Polish Kapusta (cabbage) and Breaded Chicken Patties.  Trust me when I say ... yum!  Bacon and Polish kielbasa (sausage) make this kapusta so flavorful!  You can eat Kapusta on its own or serve it with breaded chicken patties and mashed potatoes, like my mom does.

Polish kielbasa from your local supermarket will work fine in this recipe but if you have a Polish meat market near you, definitely pick up a link or two! I was fortunate because I had some kielbasa in the freezer from when my mom came for a visit not too long ago.  She has a Polish meat market near her in New Jersey that has the best kielbasa! Speaking of kielbasa, you have to check out the Kielbasa Festival "Mr. Kielbasa" mascot video at the end of my recipe! Hilarious!


I use my secret ingredient, Vegeta, in this recipe. Natalie Miletic of The Examiner said it best. “Vegeta is an all-purpose seasoning blend that can simply be described if you imagine a powdered bullion cube. Grandmother's from the region, known as nonna or baba, will testify that it offers a salty, savory addition to meals, helping to round them out and give the sense of all-day cooking, namely because of the predominant flavors of salt and dehydrated vegetables such as, carrot, parsnip, onion, potato celery, and parsley that are included in this seasoning mix.”

Vegeta seems like it has a high salt content but that is because of the dried concentration of vegetables in it. If you do not have Vegeta on-hand, I am sure you are wondering about how much salt to add, especially when you are working with raw meat and you can't taste it. So, I decided to do a little experiment to find out how much salt will be required if I am using one tablespoon of Vegeta because quite frankly, I use Vegeta in a lot of my recipes and it will be nice to give you an approximate amount.  

My Vegeta vs. Salt Experiment: 

I poured 4 cups of water into two separate pots. I seasoned one pot with a tablespoon of Vegeta and the other pot with a teaspoon of salt.  The salted water tasted like it had a similar amount of salt as the Vegeta-seasoned water. 

Based on my taste experiment, I am going to estimate that for one tablespoon of Vegeta, you will need one teaspoon of salt. I could be wrong and I apologize if I am but that is what my taste buds are telling me.

Mama Jozefa's Polish Kapusta

You will need for 4 servings:

• 1 head of green cabbage, roughly chopped
• 2 carrots, shredded
• 2 medium vine-ripened tomatoes, peeled and chopped
• 4 strips of bacon, chopped
• 1-2 links of Polish Kielbasa (sausage)
• About 1/3 cup of dill, finely chopped
• Water (about 16 cups-8 cups to preboil the cabbage and another 8 cups for stew)
• 2 Tbsp. of Vegeta seasoning
• 1 Tbsp. of butter
• 1 Tbsp. of flour
• Salt and pepper

Hardware:

• 1 large pot for soup
• Small frying pan
• Cheese grater (optional if you purchased shredded carrot)
• Small plate
• Paper towel to drain bacon fat

Directions:

Prepare the cabbage:

• Discard the wilted layers and cut the cabbage in half.

• Then, cut each piece into half again. 

• Take each wedge of the cabbage head and cut the core out by laying it flat and cutting diagonally.

• Roughly chop the cabbage and place it in a large pot.

• Cover with about 8 cups of water and bring to boil on medium heat.

While the cabbage is coming to a boil, prep the vegetables:

• If you are working with whole carrots, peel and shred them.

• Carefully peel the skins off of the tomatoes and roughly chop them.

• Finely chop the dill.

• Dice up the kielbasa.

Now, for the bacon:

• Heat up a small frying pan.

• Cut up the bacon into small pieces and fry them until crispy.

• Cover a plate with a paper towel and place the crispy bacon bits to drain the fat. Set aside.  

Back to the cabbage:

• Once the cabbage is boiling, drain the water and cover the cabbage with fresh water-about another 8 cups.

• Add a pinch of pepper and 2 Tbsp of Vegeta and bring to a boil.  If you do not have Vegeta, season the cabbage with salt according to your preference.

• Once the cabbage is boiling, add the dill, tomatoes, kielbasa, and carrots.  Cook for 30 minutes.

• Towards the last 5 minutes, make a roux to thicken the stew.

Roux:

• Heat up a small frying pan and melt 1 tablespoon of butter.

• When you see the butter bubble, add 1 tablespoon of flour and stir until combined.  It should turn a beige color.

• Pour the roux into the cabbage and stir. Cook for additional 10 minutes.

• Turn off the heat, toss in the bacon, stir, and put a lid on the pot to keep it warm.

Breaded Chicken Patties

For 4 patties, you will need:

• 1 lb. of ground chicken
• 1/2 of a small white onion, finely chopped
• 3 Tbsp. of butter
• 2 eggs, one for meat mixture and another for bread crumb coating
• 3/4 cup of plain bread crumbs for meat PLUS 1/2 for bread crumb coating
• 1 Tbsp. of Vegeta
• Salt and Pepper 

Hardware:

• Large frying pan
• Large bowl
• 2 small plates

Directions:

• Heat up the frying pan. 

• Finely chop the onion and saute it with 1 tablespoon of butter until tender and slightly caramelized. Allow it to cool before adding it to the meat mixture.

• In a large bowl, combine ground chicken, one egg, 1 tablespoon of Vegeta or 1 teaspoon of salt, 3/4 bread crumbs, pinch of pepper, and the sautéed onions.

• Separate the meat mixture into fours, roll each section into a ball, and then, flatten each ball into a disk about 1 inch thick.

• Heat up the large frying pan on medium-high heat.  

• Take 2 small plates and pour 1/2 a cup of bread crumbs on one and crack an egg in the other one.  Season the egg with a dash of salt and pepper.

• Add 2 tablespoons of butter into the skillet.

• As the butter is melting, beat the egg with a whisk or a fork.

• Dip one chicken patty at a time into the egg, completely covering it then dip it into the bread crumbs, also covering it entirely.

• Transfer to the frying pan.  Fry the patties about 5-7 minutes on each side.

Serve the patties along with a scoop or two of the kapusta.  My mom also serves chunky mashed potatoes to soak up the wonderful kapusta juice. 

For this week, my class assignment was to include a video so naturally I tried searching for something relevant to my blog entry but when nothing really interesting came up for "kapusta", I searched "kielbasa" and found out there is an annual Kielbasa Festival in Plymouth, Pennsylvania and...there's a mascot! 

I am still on a cupcake mission.  I have not found a recipe that caught my eye yet but if you have one, please share!  I think what I am ultimately going to do is just use plain ‘ol cake mix from a box and maybe give Alton Brown’s frosting recipe another try only decreasing the powered sugar from 1 pound to half a pound.  I will keep you posted!

Vanilla Frosted Chiffon Cupcake Recreation

I am on a quest to find a perfect cupcake recipe for my son’s first birthday party.  I am looking for a fluffy, light and delicious cupcake with a frosting that is not overly sweet. It would also be great if they do not need to be refrigerated. 

I thought I found the perfect recipe when I came across Alton Brown’s “Honey, I Shrunk the Cake” on his show, “Good Eats” but I am not sure if this is “the one”.  I can’t say that I was disappointed in the recipe itself but quite possibly in my own execution of the recipe. What I thought was going to be an easy cupcake recipe turned out to be quite a challenge for a beginner.  First, I could not figure out nor could I find any information online on how to measure 5 1/4 ounces of cake flour so after what seemed like an eternity of online research, I broke down and bought a food scale from Bed, Bath and Beyond.  The second challenge was figuring out what I could use in place of a paddle attachment on my “wanna be” Kitchen Aid stand mixer. I gave up and decided to just use the regular attachment that came with my hand mixer.  

I followed the recipe to the best of my ability and the cupcakes were not terrible; they just weren’t what I expected.  Something was off besides the frosting being way too sweet! I felt like my tooth was going to rot as soon as I bit into one. My husband took all 22 cupcakes to his softball game and returned with an empty tray.  That’s not necessarily good news considering it was 9:45 at night and the majority of the guys do not eat before the game so I’m sure they would have eaten anything put out in front of them! The general consensus was that the cupcakes were very sweet. Definitely not what I want to feed my one year old or his adorable little buddies.

Aside from the frosting, which I feel can be tweaked by simply adding less powdered sugar, the actual cupcake recipe stumps me. Instead of coming out light and fluffy, they almost tasted like pound cake minus the flavor and they didn’t rise. But this again, could have been my fault. Maybe, I didn’t incorporate the egg whites properly into the batter or maybe opening up the oven door to take a peek at the cupcake’s progress was a “no-no”.  Another thing I know I goofed on was not lining the muffin pan with cupcake liners.  Common sense told me to do so but I second-guessed myself when Alton Brown was saying not to grease the cups.  Later I realized, he was referring to actual mugs not a muffin pan. We live and we learn! 

Calling all bakers! I would really love to hear from you. Help! Where did I go wrong? If you have some advice or suggestions or a new cupcake recipe for me to try, I am all ears! I have until March 5th to create a perfect cupcake from scratch otherwise, I will be taking the box cake mix route.  

The following is a detailed step-by-step synopsis of the "Honey, I Shrunk the Cake" videos and the Chiffon Cupcake recipe found on the Food Network website. If you would like to follow along with the videos, you can find them below my instructions.

Vanilla Frosted Chiffon Cupcakes

You will need for 24 cupcakes:

Dry Ingredients:

• 5 1/4 ounce of cake flour
• 1 tsp of kosher salt
• 1 1/2 tsp of baking powder (aluminum free)
• Food scale that can measure .1 ounce

Batter:

• 5 large eggs
• 1/4 cup of vegetable oil
• 1/4 cup of water
• 1 tsp of vanilla extract
• 5 ounces of sugar

Egg whites:

• 5/8 tsp of cream of tartar
• 1 ounce of sugar

Hardware:

• 2 muffin pans
• Food scale that can measure .1 ounce
• Stand Mixer with a paddle attachment (A.K.A. Flat Beater) and/or hand mixer with a whisk attachment
• Sifter or a metal strainer, as in my case
• 2 large mixing bowls
• 2 medium bowls for splitting the egg white mixture into thirds
• 2 small bowls for separating the egg whites
• Rubber spatula
• Cupcake paper liners
• Ice cream scooper (optional)
• Toothpick

If you are making the frosting, you will need:

• 6 ounces of room temperature unsalted butter, which is about a stick and about 1 Tbsp of another stick of butter
• 1 large egg, room-temperature 

Directions:

• Preheat oven to 325 degrees.

• Place paper liners into two 12 cup muffin pans.
• If you are making frosting, take out a stick and a half of butter as well as an egg because they need to be room temperature.

Prepare dry ingredients:

• Measure 5 1/4 ounces of cake flour on your scale along with 1 teaspoon of kosher salt and 1 1/2 teaspoon of baking powder. Make sure it is precise.
• In a medium bowl sift the flour, baking powder, and salt.

 

• Whisk the flour, baking powder and salt together and set it to the side.

Prepare wet ingredients:

• Get your two small bowls ready. Separate the egg yolk from the egg whites.  Crack the egg, drain out the egg whites into a one small bowl using the egg shell and drop the egg yolk into the other bowl. Try to make sure that the egg yolk does not accidentally mix into the egg whites. If it does, just scoop it out.

 

• Now, transfer the egg yolks into a large mixing bowl and pour in 5 ounces of sugar.
• Beat the yolks and sugar with a hand mixer until the mixture is a pale yellow color and see ribbons when you lift the mixer in the “off” position.

 

• Add 1/4 cup of water, 1/4 cup of vegetable oil and 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract and beat to combine until smooth.

Combine the dry and wet ingredients as follows:

• Add the flour, baking powder and kosher salt mixture a little bit at a time to avoid it going all over the place. Beat until blended together. Set the batter to the side.

 

Now for the egg whites:

• Change the attachment on the blender to a whisk. Transfer the egg whites into a large mixing bowl. 
• Measure 5/8 teaspoon of cream of tartar and 1 ounce of sugar.
• Add cream of tartar and whisk the egg whites on a high speed until they become foamy.
• Decrease the speed to low and while gradually adding the ounce of sugar.
• Now, increase the speed to high and continue whisking for about 2 minutes until stiff peaks form.

 

Combine the egg whites with the batter as follows:

• Separate the egg white mixture into thirds. Easiest way to do this is by placing one third of the mixture into 2 separate medium bowls and leaving the last third in the bowl you are already using.

 

• Grab a whisk and pour in the first bowl of egg whites into the batter and whisk in quickly until combined.

 

• Now, grab a rubber spatula and pour the second bowl of egg whites into the batter and gently push your spatula down and fold over while rotating the bowl.  Try to do this as few times as possible.

 

• Next, pour in the last bowl of egg whites and gently fold them in with the spatula even quicker then before without over-beating it. If a little egg white foam is visible, that’s okay.

 

• Take the ice cream scoop and fill the muffin pans with the batter. If you are not using an ice cream scoop, then fill the muffin pans 3/4 of the way. 

 

• Place the muffin pans on the middle rack of the oven and bake for 30 minutes or so the recipe says.  Alton Brown also said not to open the oven door because the chiffon will fall but I did not listen because my gut feeling said to check on them. I took my cupcakes out at 20 minutes and I am glad I did because they seemed overdone. I would use your best judgment.  If you know your oven tends to bake things faster than a recipe calls for, then check on them sooner.  It’s a risk but so is leaving the cupcakes in there for the full duration and finding them burnt to a crisp. So, my ultimate recommendation is to check on them after 15 minutes by sticking a toothpick into the center of the cupcake.  If it comes out clean, they’re done! 

 

• Allow the cupcakes to completely cool before frosting them.

Vanilla Frosting

You will need:

• 6 ounces of room temperature unsalted butter
• 2 ounces of shortening
• 1 room temperature large egg
• 1 pound of powdered sugar, which in my opinion is way too much because the frosting was extremely sweet
• 1 tsp of vanilla extract

Hardware:

• Large mixing bowl
• Food scale that can measure .1 ounce
• Stand Mixer with a paddle attachment or hand mixer
• Rubber spatula

Directions:

• In a large mixing bowl, combine 6 ounces of room temperature unsalted butter and 2 ounces of shortening and cream on high until light and fluffy using the paddle attachment or in my case, a hand mixer. With a paddle attachment, Alton Brown says it should take 3-4 minutes.

 

• Decrease the speed of the stand mixer (or turn off the hand mixer) and add one room temperature egg. Beat for a couple minutes on a high speed until well-combined.

 

• Turn off the mixer and add the powered sugar half cup at a time.  Slowly turn on the machine so the sugar doesn’t fly all over the place. Blend each half cup in before adding another one. Continue adding the powdered sugar until its gone.

 

• Now, turn the machine on a low speed or turn off the hand mixer and add 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract.  Turn the machine back up to high speed and beat the frosting until it is smooth and light, about 3 minutes.

 

• Apply the frosting to the cupcakes or you can refrigerate it for a couple days.  If you refrigerate it, make sure it is room temperature before spreading it onto the cupcakes.

Next week, I hope to try out a new cupcake recipe, hopefully one that you share with me.