These days, I make a gluten free version of the cabbage Pancakes with shrimp. If you are not gluten-free just replace thees flours with all purpose white wheat flour. You can omit the shrimp and the pancakes are still delicious. We serve our pacakes with sriracha mayo and furikaki.  Furikaki is a mix of sesame and seaweed and other interesting flavorings. Right now I’m obsessed with kim chi flavored furikaki. I grew up in Hawaii eating Asian food every day, so I kind of feel like everything tasted better with a sprinkling of seaweed and sesame seeds.

Other Cabbage Ideas

Each winter, we get a truly profound amount of cabbage in the last few deliveries from our CSA (Community Supported Farmshare). In the picture above I am holding the amount of cabbage we might get in ONE farmshare. We get 6-8 farmshare deliveries with cabbage in them fall/ winter. Luckily cabbage keeps well. We eat Cabbage Pancakes a couple of times a week for about 4 months straight. Amazingly, we don’t seem to get tired of them. I also use cabbage in Extra Vegetable Pad Thai and in a soupy vegetable and cellophane noodle dish that I will come up with a better name for and post about someday. We always make at least one batch of Madhur Jaffrey’s Indian Spiced Cabbage. If we get savoy or napa cabbage we roast it with walnuts and pecorino. Red cabbage is made into enough Borscht to fill my entire freezer and gets eaten with Kimchi Grilled Cheese in the last few months of winter. Some years. I have made kimchi or sauerkraut, but in truth I prefer store bought and I don’t really have room for massive fermentation projects other than my sourdough. Speaking of sourdough- I sometimes use sourdough discard in these pancakes, so I’ve included directions for that here.

Japanese Cabbage Pancakes

Ingredients

• 1 egg
• 1/4 cup water and 1/2 cup flour OR 3/4 cup sourdough discard (215 gram)
• 1 Tbs tamari
• 1/2 Tb sesame oil
• 2 cups green cabbage, shredded very fine
• 1 carrot, grated
• 2 scallions, sliced
• oil for frying
• 8 raw wild caught shrimps, peels and tails removed
• 1/4 cup mayonnaise
• 1 Tablespoon sriracha
• furikaki

Instructions

1. In a large bowl, whisk together the eggs, water, soy sauce, and sesame oil until smooth. Whisk in the flours.
2. Add the cabbage, carrots, and green onion to the batter and stir until the vegetables are mixed and everything is evenly coated in batter.
3. Heat 1/2 Tbsp oil in a skillet over medium high heat. I use a very large cast iron. If your skillet is smaller you may need to use two, or do them in 2 batches an keep the first ones warm in the oven. Once the oil is hot, add the batter in 4 even piles. Press two shelled shrimp into each pancake. Cook the pancake until golden brown on the bottom (3-5 minutes), then flip and cook until golden brown on the second side. Press it down into the hot skillet to form a circle. Place a cover on the skillet to hold in the steam, which will help the cabbage soften as it cooks for 3-5 minutes more. Add more oil to the skillet as needed.
4. While the pancakes cook, prepare the sriracha mayo. mix together 1/4 cup mayonnaise and 1 Tbsp sriracha in a small bowl.
5. When the pancakes are done drizzle with sriracha mayo and sprinkle with furikaki. Serve them hot!