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Cabbage and Bacon
Boil a piece of salt pork until it is about three-quarters cooked. Then take it out of the water, drain it, and place two or three rashers of bacon in the saucepan. Lay on these a cabbage which has been thoroughly washed and cut into quarters, and put the pork over the cabbage. Cover the whole with nicely flavored stock, and pepper, nutmeg, and parsley, but no salt, as it will most likely be found there is sufficient in the bacon and stock. Simmer gently until the cabbage is cooked. Place the vegetables on a hot dish with the pork in the midst of them; thicken the gravy, and pour it over the whole. Time to boil the cabbage, twenty minutes. Sufficient for four or five persons.
A one-pot braise of salt pork, bacon and cabbage in stock, of the kind that filled out a household dinner for four or five. Nothing here is difficult, but the salt pork and the cabbage timing both need attention.
- Salt pork needs desalting firstModern salt pork and gammon are cured hard and the boiling water is discarded, so soak the piece for several hours or overnight in cold water, changing it once or twice. The recipe's warning to add no salt is the hinge of the dish: taste the stock before it goes in the pan.
- "Three-quarters cooked"The recipe gives neither weight nor time. For a piece of a pound or so, expect something under an hour at a bare simmer, until a skewer meets slight resistance. It finishes in the cabbage pot, so undercook rather than over.
- RashersA rasher is a slice of bacon. Two or three thick-cut slices laid on the pan bottom act as a fat layer that keeps the cabbage from catching; unsmoked or lightly smoked suits the dish better than heavily smoked supermarket bacon.
- Twenty minutes on the cabbageThat figure suits a dense, close-headed cabbage cut into quarters. A modern Savoy or green cabbage quartered will usually be done in 12-15 minutes of gentle simmering, and a sweetheart cabbage in less. Cook to tender, not collapsed.
- Stock and depth"Cover the whole" need not mean swimming in liquid; enough barely to cover the meat and cabbage will do, and a close-fitting pan needs less. Too much liquid leaves a thin gravy and a washed-out flavour.
- NutmegFreshly grated, and a light hand: a few rasps over the whole pan. Nutmeg turns up often enough with pork and cabbage in cookery of this kind, and it reads as warmth rather than as spice.
- Thickening the gravyLift out the meat and cabbage to a warm dish, then reduce the cooking liquid hard, or whisk in a beurre manie of a tablespoon each of butter and flour. Strain out the parsley stalks before pouring over.
- ServingFour or five as written, as part of a larger meal. Boiled or steamed potatoes are the usual accompaniment and will take up the gravy.