Endure

Last night, I made stuffed cabbage rolls for our St. Patrick's dinner tonight.

It was quite an involved process. And before you are disgusted by the thought of cabbage rolls, they were stuffed with bratwurst and covered in a spicy bacon, tomato sauce.

Bacon makes everything taste better.

I cooked the bratwurst in the morning with the rice. Then, after work, I steamed the cabbage. While it steamed I cooked the bacon, onion, red pepper, and simmered those all in tomato puree.

After the sauce was ready, and the cabbage had drained, I took the bratwurst and rice mixture out of the fridge and started stuffing the cabbage leaves.

As if all of that wasn't involved enough, the next part got more so.

The recipe instructed me to cut the main vein out of the leaf, scoop one-third of a cup of the bratwurst/rice mixture into the leaf, and then roll it like a burrito. Except that I just cut out part of the leaf and rolling it as suggested was next to impossible. No matter which way I rolled, stuffing kept falling out through slits. Or I was rolling it in such a way that the stuffing to rolled cabbage ratio was uneven.

But I knew I could endure. I continued stuffing and rolling. I eventually filled my 9 x 13 baking dish with ten rolls. I covered them with the sauce and tucked them away in the refrigerator until this afternoon when Bill took them out for me.

We were also able to endure the forty-five minute wait while they baked.

Bill and I agreed that the cabbage rolls were worth the process.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!