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A Family Feast readers are sometimes very vocal – especially in the comment section of a few of our Polish family recipes. I don’t mind at all – I love the passion of our fellow foodies!
One particular reader inspired today’s recipe for Lazanki with Mushrooms and Beef. A while back I received a comment on our popular haluski recipe where a reader named Katarzyna suggested that our fried cabbage and noodles dish should not be called haluski – but rather it was more like a dish called “lazanki”.
I have to admit that I had never heard of Lazanki before, and it was not a dish that my Polish grandmother ever cooked for us when we visited her every Sunday growing up. So I googled the recipe and found this recipe over on PolskaFoods.com. It looked fantastic!
According to Wikipedia, Lazanki dates back to the mid-16th century when Queen Bona Sforza, the Italian Wife of King Sigismund I of Poland brought high Italian cuisine to the Poland-Lithuanian Commonwealth.
After making today’s Lazanki with Mushrooms and Beef recipe, I can see how this dish was early fusion cuisine: Italian-inspired pasta or noodles plus sausage or meat, mixed with cabbage, sauerkraut and mushrooms – the latter being ingredients prevalent in Polish cuisine. Sour cream and a sprinkle of fresh parsley is also added to the top of Lazanki. We used ground beef in our recipe today – but I think ground pork or sausage would be another delicious meat alternative.
Lazanki can be made with or without meat and this article mentions that this delicious dish is often served on Christmas Eve for the traditional Polish Wigilia Feast.
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Lazanki with Mushrooms and Beef
Ingredients
- 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
- 10 tablespoons butter, divided
- 1 pound Cremini mushrooms (baby bella), sliced
- 1 pound 80/20 ground beef
- 3 cups onion, diced large
- 2 pounds green cabbage, cored and shredded about 1/4″ thick
- 1 tablespoon caraway seeds
- 1 1/2 cups well drained sauerkraut (1 14.4-ounce can)
- 1 bay leaf
- 1 1/2 teaspoons dry thyme
- 1/2 teaspoon dry marjoram
- 1 teaspoon paprika
- 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
- 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
- 1 cup sour cream, divided
- 1 12–ounce bag egg noodles
- 1/4 cup fresh parsley chopped
Instructions
- Note: If you have a wide, high skillet or fry pan, that is best as this dish needs a large surface to caramelize. However, a 5 quart Dutch oven will work just fine.
- Heat olive oil and two tablespoons of butter over high heat. Once the butter starts to brown, add the mushrooms and cook on high for ten minutes. Remove the cooked mushrooms to a medium bowl.
- Lower temperature to medium high.
- Add two more tablespoons of butter and once melted, add ground beef. Cook until no longer pink, about 3-4 minutes. Remove to the bowl with the mushrooms.
- Add two more tablespoons of butter and add the onions. Cook until caramelized, about five minutes.
- Move the onions to the outer edge of the pan and add two more tablespoons of butter and add cabbage and caraway seeds. Cook about five minutes to start to break down the cabbage then add the mushrooms and beef back in along with the remained butter, the well-drained sauerkraut, bay leaf, thyme, marjoram, paprika, salt, pepper and one half cup of the sour cream.
- Once the mixture starts to bubble, reduce to medium to medium low and cook uncovered for 45 minutes, stirring frequently with a wooden spoon to make sure it doesn’t stick. If it starts to stick before 45 minutes, add a little olive oil and continue to cook.
- Remove and discard bay leaf.
- While Lazanki is cooking, cook egg noodles per package directions.
- To serve, spoon noodles into a bowl, then place ladles full of the Lazanki on top. Top with a dollop of sour cream, and sprinkle with chopped parsley.
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You may also like:
Haluski (Fried Cabbage and Noodles)
No stars. Content is locked to prevent printing. Why offer a print option if you’re going to block it? I cook from paper recipes and can’t even try this.
Sorry AJ. Thank for alerting us to the problem-I’m seeing it myself. Obviously this isn’t how the recipe format should work – I’ll be reaching out to our developers to fix. Appreciate the heads up.
looks so good
Thanks Henrietta – hope you’ll give the recipe a try!
Excellent- even my kids enjoyed this delicious dish!
Thanks Debra!
you know it’s authentic when it starts with a stick of butter! Just finished cooking- super easy and very flavorful. We’ve added it to our rotation
Thank you!
LOL – so glad you enjoyed the recipe Kristin!
“Lazanki z Kapusta i Grzybami” is always a vegetarian dish in Poland – never heard of it being cooked with meat or sausage. This recipe looks as if it’s borrowed from that for Bigos. Of course Polish Americans can adapt traditional Polish recipes to their taste but I’m sure no-one in Poland would recognise it.
Thank you for your insights!
Have you tried freezing it? Without the noodles I would imagine.
Hi Jenny – We haven’t, but without the noodles and sour cream, I think you’d be fine freezing the rest of the dish.
This dish was awesome! Thank you for sharing the recipe! My grandma would be proud of me!
Aw…I bet she would be proud Kenneth! 🙂 So glad you enjoyed the recipe!
Made this today but ran into a couple of issues. Was I supposed to shred the cabbage after coring it? I did, about 1/4 inch. Were the noodles to be tossed with the skillet ingredients or do they serve as a base for the beef and mushroom mixture? In any case, it was a very tasty dish and I thank you for the recipe.
Hi Karen – Thank you for taking the time to write to us today, and especially for being so nice about pointing out the details we left out of the instructions. You are absolutely correct – the cabbage does need to be shredded, and yes – you can toss the noddles together with the cabbage mixture or use the noodles as bed for the lazanki. I will make the updates ASAP to avoid any further confusion. Thank you again – our apologies!
Martha ,
I can’t wait to try this recipe since we loved the recipe for Haluski so much. I have made it at least 5 or 6 times, sharing with friends and family. Now I have another reason to use my Polish pottery.
Linda
Hi Linda! I hope you enjoy this recipe too! The Lazanki has more of a ‘bite’ from the sauerkraut so while similar to the Haluski recipe, it tastes very different. And yes – always a good reason to use that beautiful Polish pottery! 🙂