Welcome to our new cooking series for 2022 – The Twelve Months of Vegetables. To start us off I chose cabbage because of its significance to the new year. According to popular legend your New Year’s Day meal should be pork for prosperity, cabbage for money and black-eyed peas for luck.

When many people think of cabbage they think of sauerkraut for the New Year, traditional Cole slaw at barbeques, or boiled cabbage with corned beef on St. Patrick’s Day.

Cabbage has been around since the first century. It became a food staple in the Middle Ages in Europe and may have been first domesticated on that continent. Ancient Greeks and Romans believed consuming cabbage helped prevent intoxication and could cure hangovers.

Cabbage is a versatile vegetable. It can be eaten raw, boiled, sauteed, pickled, fermented, steamed, stewed, roasted, or braised. It’s popular in Asian cuisine, American cuisine, and several European cuisines.

For the first recipe of the year, I decided to go with one of my own for Mahi Mahi soft tacos. Unless I’m following a new recipe, I seldom measure my ingredients, so please bear with me. You can also substitute tilapia, cod, shrimp, savory sweet potatoes, or black beans for Mahi Mahi.

For this recipe I used 14 ounces of Mahi Mahi in thin strips cooked in parchment paper. I place the parchment paper on a baking sheet, brush it with olive oil, add the fish strips drizzle lightly with oil then brush on garlic, black pepper, red pepper, taco, and chipotle seasoning and cumin. I turn the fish pieces over and brush the other side lightly with the spice mixture before squeezing lime juice on the pieces and putting a lime slice on top of each strip. I wrap the parchment paper around the fish closing it up and bake at 4oo degrees for 20-25 minutes.  If I’m using shrimp, I sauté them on the stove with the same ingredients (minus the extra lime slices) until they are pink.  For savory sweet potatoes, I dice the sweet potatoes with the peel on and cook for about 20 minutes with the seasonings in the air fryer. If I am using black beans, I heat in a saucepan and simmer with the spices.

While the Mahi Mahi is in the oven I dice onions, jalapenos, red bell peppers, garlic, and pineapple. I grate or thinly slice cabbage and add to the mixture. I season with black pepper, taco seasoning, chipotle pepper sauce, cumin, red pepper, and lime juice. After mixing well, I add Vegan mayonnaise. When the fish is finished, I warm tortillas in the oven.

I layer fish, Chipotle sauce, the slaw mixture and garnish with avocado slices and a squeeze of lime juice.

This recipe is one of our favorites and it’s a spicy way to serve cabbage. I prefer it to vinegar based slaws because the tartness comes from lime juice, and you can easily substitute sweet potatoes or black beans to make a vegan/vegetarian option.

Next month we will be featuring zucchini.

The Twelve Months of Vegetables

January                             Cabbage                           Mahi Mahi Soft Tacos

February                           Zucchini                            Choco;ate Zucchini Bread

March                               Leeks

April                                   Carrots

May                                   Beets

June                                   Kale

July                                    Broccoli

August                               Potatoes

September                       Green Beans     

October                            Spinach

November                        Corn

December                        Asparagus