Advent 3: Pickled Red Cabbage and highly flavoured gravy - with Delia Smith and pickled red cabbage

December 3rd

Luke 1:29-32

²⁹ Mary was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be. ³⁰ But the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary; you have found favour with God. ³¹ You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call him Jesus. ³² He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High.

All Angels sing "The Angel Gabriel came down" - heavenly voices - please click on the arrow and take a moment to listen to this beautiful song.

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That wonderful rendition of a lovely Advent song brings another childhood memory.  This was always sung at our school carol service and we tittered as silly girls do when we sang "most highly flavoured gravy" instead of "highly favoured lady" - shameful I know.

I should really give you a recipe for flavoursome gravy, but I'm going to let Delia tell you how to do that as she's so much better at it - click here to follow her instructions

What I would like to share with you today is a quick, simple and easy recipe for pickled red cabbage. One decent sized cabbage makes quite a few jars. All you need to do is slice it up, as fine or as chunky as you like it, and put a layer into a large bowl, sprinkle on salt, then add another layer, more salt, and so on until all the cabbage is in the bowl.  Cover and leave overnight (the cabbage, not you).

Next day, Rinse the excess salt off using a colander and pack the shredded/sliced cabbage into jars. Pour vinegar into each jar until it covers the cabbage, and seal. You can use ordinary malt vinegar or the pickling/spiced variety - your choice.

As you do this you will see a fascinating transformation; the blueish cabbage (alkaline) will turn bright red as you pour over the vinegar (acid).  So that's the school connection - good old litmus paper testing, not bad words to beautiful carols.

It is best to leave the pickled cabbage for about three weeks so at Christmas you will be eating it at its best (great with cold turkey).  

 For our Advent Recipe Book, available from Amazon, just click here