the freshly served cowlslaw
Naturally, a good coleslaw cannot be missing from a BBW. It makes a perfect accompaniment to fatty meats. For example, in a pitta with pulled pork.
I have been looking for the ideal recipe for a long time, and I believe I have found it now.
For questions you can mail to
hansiart@upcmail.nl
GENERAL THOUGHTS
The coleslaw is made from cabbage and carrot. In their raw form, these ingredients are quite tough and woody in mouthfeel.
So the main processing steps are aimed at making the salad more tender.
The kitchen aids we need are:
- a good mandoline
- a sharp cooking knive or chinese cleaver
PREPARE:
the freshly shredded cowlslaw.
To get the most tender salad, please follow these steps.
shredding
We need to cut the cabbage as thin as possible and the best way to do this is using a mandoline. Cut the cabbage into pieces so that they can be shredded without the hard core. Now shred the amount you need and put it in a bowl.
kneading
The purpuse is to destroy as much of the cells in the cabbage to make it more tender. We can do this by adding some salt and/or sugar and knead the cabbage firmly with your hands, so that it releases a lot of moisture. When done put the bowl aside and start shredding the carrot. This is best done on a kitchen grater. Mix this in the cabbage and let it sit for an hour or so.
THE RIPENING
the squeezed cowlslaw in the brine.
When the colwlslaw is kneaded we can let it ripe a little. We do this by letting the cabbage sit in the brine for some time (24hrs in the refrigerator). During this time the following happens:
- Osmosis: Salt and sugar in the dressing pull moisture out of the shredded cabbage.
- Softening: As water leaves the plant cells, the crisp cabbage softens and wilts.
In germany they add carbonated mineral water and put a weight on the cabbage to make sure it is submerged in the liquid.
When it is time to finish the salad, we need to get rid of the brine. We can squeeze it by hand or drain it, put it in a towel and put a weight on this.
THE DRESSING
the liquid has been squeezed out.
We make a dressing using the following ingedients
- 4 dinerspoons of mayonaise
- 3 dinerspoons of buttermilk
- 1 dinerspoon vinager
- 1 teaspoon sugar
- to taste: fresh milled black pepper
Mix this together and taste.
There are many possibilities for variation. You can add various green herbs, (dill, parsley, cellery), (spring)onion or whatever you like. Cumin seeds are popular in Germany.
remark
There is no salt in the dressing because the cabbage itself may contain a bit salt (we added before the kneading). When you squeezed the moist out drasticly you lost this so you may need to add a little salt. Taste!
FINISHING
mixing it together
After we got rid of the moist in our cowlsla, we can mix in our dressing, bit by bit. How much you add is a matter of taste, but enough is enough; we don't want a semi-liquid porridge.
further ripening
Basically our salad is ready now but the taste and mouthfeel will improve when we let it rest a day.
If you taste a bite you can assess whether further processing is necessary.
Likely you decide that the salad could be more tender. This can be achieved by keeping the cabbage covered in the refrigerator for 24 hours. Another thing you can do is put the colwsla on a cutting shelf and chop it more finely. I use my chinese cleaver for that.
serving tip
The combination of warm meat with this salad is unparalleled. A pita half filled with pulled pork and the cowlsla on top of it...