Delicious Keto Cabbage Rolls that are low-carb and loaded with flavor - one of my favorite dinner recipes!
Traditional cabbage rolls can be pretty carb-heavy due to their fillings; while the cabbage leaves themselves are tasty and healthy, this dish originally comes from cultures that aren’t, shall we say, keto-friendly by default.
But this tasty keto dinner recipe will give you the tools and instructions you need to make great tasting keto cabbage rolls without compromising of labor quality!
Keto Cabbage Rolls
Ah, cabbage rolls.
They’re some of the healthiest and tastiest foods you can make if you want to incorporate leafy green vegetables like cabbage in your diet naturally.
As a result, we’ve decided to share a high-quality keto cabbage roll recipe so you can keep up your natural vitamins and enjoy the stuffed delight of great-tasting cabbage rolls without consuming too many carbs.
The secret for this keto cabbage recipe is that we replace some of the ingredients with keto varieties, which naturally don't have too many carbs, and replace other ingredients outright with tasty alternatives.
How to Make Low Carb Cabbage Rolls for Keto!
Making keto cabbage rolls is very easy, and you can do so using either a crockpot or an Instant Pot depending on what tools you have available.
Let’s dive into this delicious recipe and see how to make cabbage rolls for keto!
Cabbage Roll Ingredients
- one head of green cabbage
- ½ pound of ground pork or turkey, your choice
- 1 pound of ground beef
- one small onion, diced
- 3 tablespoons of fresh parsley, chopped
- 1 tablespoon of salt
- ¼ tablespoon of pepper
- 1 ½ cups of cauliflower rice
Sauce Ingredients
- 1 ½ cups keto tomato sauce
- 1 cup of beef broth
- ⅛ teaspoon cayenne pepper
- one clove of garlic, minced
- ½ teaspoons salt
Directions
To start, take your cabbage and remove its core using your fingers or with the assistance of a few utensils.
Then place the entire head of cabbage into a large pot that you fill with boiling salted water.
When filling this pot, be sure not to add too much salt for your accidentally make the cabbage itself too salty to taste, which can alter the flavor of the cabbage rolls later in the recipe.
Once in the boiling water, the cabbage head should only need to cook for about three minutes before being ready.
You can tell when the leaves begin to pull away easily from the head; if you need to use any kind of strength, let it boil for another minute or so.
After the leaves are pulling away from the head, let it cook for about three minutes more and remove the outer leaves as they soften progressively.
You want 15 big leaves in total to make your cabbage rolls and fill them with the stuffing we will prepare.
Once you have your 15 leaves, let them cool on a plate, then cut the thick center stem from each leaf individually.
We’d recommend using a thin but sharp knife or a similar instrument.
Now it’s time to make the filling! To do this, sauté your onion in a pan using olive oil.
Let it cool after sautéing it for between 5 and 10 minutes, then combine the onion with the ground beef, pork, salt, pepper, parsley, and cauliflower rice.
Mix all of this together in a pan and let it cook for a few minutes.
Lay out a cabbage leaf on a big plate with the stem end in front of you.
Then put about 3 tablespoons worth of the meat mixture in the center, closer to you.
Flip the right side of the leaf up to the middle, then flip the left side up, then roll the cabbage up entirely.
If done correctly, you should have a neatly wrapped cabbage roll that won’t easily fall apart and still the delicious meat mixture over the plate.
Do this process repeatedly until you have a few leaves remaining.
You should have between 10 and 12 cabbage rolls in total depending on your leaf sizes.
Next, lying your Instant Pot with a few of the cabbage leaves on the bottom.
You can place your cabbage rolls seam side down, which prevents them from splitting open during the rest of the cooking process.
Progressively stack the cabbage rolls on top of each other in layers as you run out of space at the bottom, taking care not to spill any of the meat mixture as you work.
We’d also recommend sprinkling a little bit of salt on top of each layer as you stack the cabbage rolls higher and higher.
This gives the entire batch an extra bit of zest.
Now make the sauce using the above ingredients.
You can do this by mixing it in a bowl; nothing needs to be warmed up so you can do it with a regular spoon and without heat.
Once the sauce has been mixed, pour it over the top of the rolls and allow it to drain down to the bottom.
Now close the Instant Pot top and let it pressure cook for about 18 minutes.
Once the timer has gone up, wait five minutes before releasing the pressure so they could properly.
Crock Pot Alternative for Cabbage Rolls
You can also make these using a crockpot by following the exact same process above.
The only difference is that you want to cook the low carb cabbage rolls on low for between six and seven hours or on high for between three and four hours depending on your schedule.
Stuffed Cabbage Rolls Nutritional Info
These delicious Instant Pot cabbage rolls have everything you need for a healthy and filling meal that gives you the vitamins you need without delivering a huge dose of carbs at the same time.
This batch can make 15 rolls in total (provided that you took an extra few leaves for the bottom of the Instant Pot/crockpot).
Each roll has the following nutritional elements:
- 135 cal
- 9 g of protein
- 2.5 g of carbs
- 0.5 g of fiber
- 11 g of fat
You also only get to net carbohydrates with each roll you eat, so it’s easy to combine these keto cabbage rolls with a hardcore keto diet!
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