Red Cabbage and Kohlrabi Stir Fry

I make stir fries pretty frequently (my roommates are probably sick of them) because they are a great way to use up a lot of vegetables at once. Especially the dreaded cabbage. I had 2 heads of cabbage in the fridge, one red and one white, along with some kohlrabi and some leftover peppers from chili. I decided to make a stir fry to at least get rid of some of the cabbage. I used the red cabbage because it was a bit smaller.

Cabbage and Kohlrabi Stir Fry

1/2 head red cabbage
1 large kohlrabi
1 bell pepper
1 block (14 oz) tofu
1 medium onion
1 inch piece of ginger, minced
2 cloves garlic, minced
half a jalapeno, seeds in
1/3 cup cilantro, chopped loosely, plus some for topping
2 tbsp. vegetable oil, divided

Sauce:

3 tbsp. soy sauce
2 tbsp. rice vinegar
1 tbsp. hoisin sauce
juice of 1 lime
1 tsp. cornstarch


Kohlrabi is one of the weirdest vegetables we get from the CSA, and one I had never tried before we started getting a share. It looks like an alien. Every time we have one in the fridge I am mildly concerned that it is going to turn into some kind of monster plant like Seymour in Little Shop of Horrors and eat us all. (Not really. But they are pretty weird looking.) The word kohlrabi comes from the German for cabbage turnip, which is pretty appropriate. It has a texture similar to a turnip and tastes like a broccoli stem.

The kohlrabi have to be peeled really well. I usually peel it once with a knife and again with a peeler to remove all the fibers on the outside. Otherwise they can be really tough to eat. Chop them into quarter inch sticks. It helps for stir fries to chop all the vegetables as uniformly as possible so everything cooks at the same rate. The bell pepper should also be chopped into strips and the cabbage roughly chopped into bite size pieces. This stir fry can really be made with any combination of vegetables and protein.

The ginger, garlic, and jalapenos are minced and the onion is sliced in half and then cut into strips. Mix the sauce before you start. The key to a stir fry is to have everything ready in advance before anything starts cooking, so that you can just throw things in.

Heat a wok or saute pan on high and add 1 tbsp. of vegetable oil. Olive oil doesn't work for stir fries because the smoke point is too low. Once the oil is so hot you think it's going to start on fire, add your protein. I use tofu cut into strips. Fry until one side is golden brown and then flip. If there is not enough room in the pan for all of the tofu, fry it in batches. Once both sides are cooked, remove from the pan and set aside on a plate.

Add the second tablespoon of oil. Add the onion, cook until it starts to become translucent, about 1 minute. It should start to smell amazing. Add the garlic, ginger, and jalapeno. Cook for about 2 min.

Add the vegetable that takes the longest to cook, in this case the kohlrabi. Let it cook about 3 minutes. It should not cook fully since it will continue cooking with the rest of the vegetables.

Add the next longest vegetable, the cabbage for this stir fry. Cook another 2 minutes.

Add the peppers and cilantro and cook for another minute. Add the tofu and the sauce, mix well. Cook until the sauce has thickened, another minute or two. This is possibly the prettiest thing I have ever made, between the yellow peppers and the purple cabbage.

Serve over rice or noodles.