Proprietor, Chef Sang Kim, works with a Napa cabbage in the Windup Bird Cafe in Toronto, Ontario on Thursday, November 20, 2014.Peter Power/The Globe and Mail
I love this recipe for its simplicity, and I also love the way the mustard seed lends the cabbage an almost smoky taste. My mother-in-law, Amtu Karimjee, learned to make it from her mother.
"This is a very Gujarati recipe," she says, demonstrating how the cabbage must have migrated east to India, along trade routes from where it was first domesticated. Eat this dry curry with chapati, rather than rice.
Ingredients
4 cups finely sliced fresh cabbage
2 tbsps vegetable oil
2 tsps mustard seed
1/4 tsp ground turmeric
1/4 tsp chili powder, optional
Salt to taste
Method
Heat oil in a skillet over medium-high heat. Add mustard seeds and wait for them to start to pop.Next, add the cabbage, stirring almost continuously until the vegetable browns and is as cooked as you like it. I like my cabbage quite soft and even a bit caramelized, but cook it less if you are in a rush.Stir in the turmeric, chili powder if you want a bite to your curry and salt to taste.