Coleslaw Doesn't Have to Be Boring (Move Over KFC!)

we have all seen pieces of cabbage drowning in a sea of mayonnaise and guys coleslaw doesn't have to be like that today i want to test four coleslaw recipes from around the world that's of course a classic american southern then a hearty and savory german cows a lot but also a refreshing lebanese cabbage salad and yes even in myanmar there's a southeast asian take on cabbage salad i guess because that's literally what coleslaw is so let's prove that coleslaw can be delicious nutritious cheap and yes even exciting of course everything starts with cabbage you want to get a big heavy knife and carefully cut it in half first and then into quarters see that dense thing in the middle that's the core of the cabbage the stem it's tough and woody so we need to remove that from each of the quarters first then all there's left to do is slicing the cabbage thinly across the grain to get these fine crunchy slivers you can totally also grate or shred the cabbage you're gonna get much much smaller pieces but you know sometimes that's even desirable if let's say you're using it as a topping for something but if you're using it like as a standalone salad which is my preferred way i would really stick to hand slicing it because you just get like a really nice texture they almost turn out like like cabbage noodles or something speaking of texture there's a crucial step i will definitely recommend and that's curing your cabbage by salting it about half a tablespoon of salt for a head of cabbage should do you then really want to give it a good mix and squeeze you know scrunch it up bruise it until you notice that the cabbage got quite a bit more tender the point of this step is to pull out excess moisture from the cabbage if you don't you might get a swampy pool of juice at the bottom of your coleslaw bowl i know some people actually like that but i sure don't so everything depends on how wet you like your slaw you can go anywhere from a half hour cure up to overnight this is how much water my cabbage released after a roughly 45 minute cure after which it's nice and tender yet still crunchy and ready to get dressed just one more note on the cabbage before we move on and that is the color of the cabbage i know a lot of people like to use red cabbage sometimes in combination with white cabbage and i mean there's not much wrong with that except for the fact that the color is going to leech out over time and turn everything pink if you just want to make a quick slaw and then eat all of it right away you know family style then that's really not a big deal but i do recommend making coleslaw ahead of time it actually gets quite a bit better as it sits for at least a few hours and in that case both the salt cure and using white cabbage only will help you to keep moistness and color right where you want them to be now let's begin with a classic american southern style coleslaw not too different from what you can find at kfc only much tastier to a pound of cabbage i'll add julienned carrots finely sliced sweet onions and then yes mayo okay this is the one time we'll be using mayo in this video and you know it's not like i'm completely opposed to using mayo in coleslaw in fact i think it's it's actually quite good but but you have to use it in moderation i'm using like a quarter cup of mayo for a pound of cabbage and that's totally enough now to amp up the flavor i'm also adding white vinegar some sugar for the classic sweet note a few cracks of pepper and of course celery seed powder according to my research that's the signature spice that makes american coleslaw american coleslaw give everything a very good mix i like to just get in there with my hands and you'll get a coleslaw that can easily rival the kernels do not forget that this definitely gets better as it sits over time so that's exactly what i did i rested this overnight and now i'm ready to try my kfc style southern coleslaw whatever and see how good it is yes yes nice and crunchy i'm quite impressed even with the salting and the overnight rest this turned out pretty crunchy just the right amount of mayo that makes it nice and creamy without overpowering it with globbiness also i gotta say i definitely approve of celery seeds as a spice for this so good it really adds like an herbaceous zing to everything this is super tasty and i'm not gonna lie the sugar goes a long way here it really just helps brightening the cabbage up so while this is actually pretty good i also think that this is probably the most boring way to eat coleslaw let's make things a little bit more interesting let me show you one traditional way we make coleslaw over here in germany and that is the good old krautsalad yes um and kaut in this case just means uh cabbage like many dishes in germany this one starts with pork little pieces of cured ham to be precise which is basically bacon cubes gently heat those up on medium no oil required and add a finely sliced onion that we sweat in the rendered bacon fat if you don't eat pork by the way just fry up more onions and some oil and you'll be good we're not looking to get anything super crispy here just a bit of color is totally fine add the bacon to a pound of cabbage along with some apple cider vinegar for brightness a bit of sunflower seed or any other neutral oil then a generous dollop of mustard for tang and creaminess and then to naturally amp up the sweetness we're gonna add a bit of julienned or grated apple but again there's that one spice that will make your kraut salad a real cow salad and that is caraway which is genius not only is caraway super common in traditional recipes from central and eastern europe but it's actually a natural remedy to help with well gas and if you eat a big pile of cabbage let's say that's not gonna hurt anybody and here it is my overnight rested kraut salad which smells delicious delicious the taste of tradition look if you like coleslaw and you've never tried this you you are missing out there's really only a very small amount of bacon in here but it goes such a long way it really just amps up all the flavors that makes this so comforting and rich this does 100 not feel like you're eating a dish that's mainly made out of cabbage with a little balance from the sweet apples and of course that nice and rustic note from the caraway seeds i love this okay but now let's move from haram to halal and make a lebanese-inspired coleslaw with a mediterranean touch i'll actually start this one in a slightly untraditional way with tahini tahini or sesame paste is very common in lebanon and its neighboring countries but it is not usually part of this salad however once you mix sesame paste with water or lemon juice for that matter it emulsifies like crazy and you get something that is even more creamy than mayo if you ask me but it's not mayo then for some extra richness i'm going to add some olive oil i mean you can go all jaime oliver but a little really is enough then some freshly cracked pepper and that will be the base of our lebanese slaw next pop in your cabbage and a very generous amount of minced parsley there are two more flavors i want to add in there and that is garlic and mint but again you should really consider when you're gonna eat your slaw if you plan to eat it right away fresh garlic and fresh mint is gonna work amazingly but if you wanna eat it over the course of a few days maybe not so much both of these ingredients are gonna get more intense over time and not necessarily in a good way they might get very pungent and overpower the rest of the flavors which is why i definitely recommend using garlic powder and dried mint for this salad i know it doesn't look like i'm adding a whole lot but these are dried ingredients so you got to be careful but this will give you a much more reliable balance of flavor here we go lebanese myfoof salad malfuf just means cabbage in arabic i guess and that's literally what it is it's a cabbage salad so the creaminess you get from the tahini is insane it binds everything together like nothing else will however it definitely has a little bit of a you know slightly bitter note so be careful with that if you're sensitive to bitter taste there's definitely a pretty strong lemony note which i don't mind i like sourness but if you're sensitive to that then maybe also take it easy or balance this out with sweetness i didn't add anything sweet to this one but i think a little drizzle of honey would have definitely helped quite a lot but overall it feels fresh it feels light it feels kind of wholesome and healthy i'm pretty sure the herbs are playing a pretty big role in that this is pretty good but i think this will work best if you use it as a balancing point for something really heavy like if you're eating a big chunk of meat or something i think i'll go for this one and somehow with every bite i take i want to eat more and more of it which is uh usually a pretty good sign i think but now let's get to the last type of coleslaw i wanna share today and i'm gonna assume that you have probably never heard of it so i've had the chance to visit the country of myanmar a few years back and i was really surprised to find a lot of amazing food there so you know i think burmese has got to be one of the most underrepresented cuisines on the world stage one of the coolest culinary things i discovered there was a whole category of like hand mixed salads called leto i think let's talk is how it's pronounced and one of these little was a pretty much a coleslaw of course it starts with cabbage for the tangy note we'll add the juice of one lime and then for umami and saltiness we had a bit of fish sauce classic southeast asian flavor combo and then a touch of onion oil i hope you remember what onion oil is we made that last week and one variety of onion oil namely shallot oil is extremely popular in myanmar just to give you a super quick tldr you finally slice some shallots you drop them in some oil and then you simmer those until they're crispy once you're there you can keep the oil as a condiment and the fried shallots as a garnish to make anything better and this salad is a pretty great example for that next for some color and a sweet and sour note we're also going in with a few thin tomato slices then the next ingredient is a bit of an adaptation and that is sushi ginger the thing is that in myanmar pickled ginger is quite common in salads but the type you find there is usually marinated in lime juice overnight which you can definitely try but it's pretty much just like raw ginger which i personally find a bit intense so i think the milder sweeter pickled sushi ginger is a compromise we can all live with then finally we're adding the aforementioned fried shallots as well as toasted sesame seeds and a handful of toasted peanuts that i'll just slightly crush in a mortar and pestle we're also going to add a handful of finely chopped cilantro these final few elements add quite a bit of toastiness and also a good bit of crunch and texture to this slaw which is definitely a signature feature of many southeast asian salads one of the things that sets this burmese cabbage salad we just made apart from the other slaws is the fact that this one is normally traditionally eaten right away and not rested overnight but i rested it overnight so that's what we gotta live with i'm sure it's going to be good okay the moment of truth takes me back to myanmar quite clearly the thing that makes this really good is the shallots and the shallot oil that's just like it's such a simple thing but it just makes everything better trust me you just get these like flavors that you know from like your favorite vietnamese or thai restaurant or something but they're in a crunchy coleslaw that's pretty cool i think this one is definitely the most outside the box and unusual of the sloth but also it's the one that i will recommend you to try the most because this one really expands your understanding of what coleslaw can be i'm a big big fan of this yum really cool the pickled ginger the sushi ginger works incredibly well in here by the way the cilantro if you're one of the people who doesn't hate cilantro it's actually a really good like herby edition i mean what can i say okay that was a lot of cabbage so i'm gonna go ahead and eat a spoonful of caraway now to protect the people around me if you know what i mean but i hope you got some inspiration from you know this little deep dive into the world of coleslaw and if you know any other like hacks to make great coleslaw if you know other countries takes on coleslaw please drop them in the comments below so we can all become like a club of internationally minded food nerds that know what to cook and why if that makes any kind of sense anyhow lots of cabbage talk i'll see you in the next one

Channel: My Name Is Andong

Views: 483,842

Rating: 4.9343486 out of 5

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Id: Lmhq4mJIjQ4

Length: 13min 24sec (804 seconds)

Published: Tue Sep 01 2020