Sautéed Cabbage
142 Comments
Mar 10, 2025
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Sautéed cabbage is a simple vegetable side dish with more flavor than you’d imagine. Sliced cabbage is sautéed with garlic and onions, then caramelized until golden and naturally sweet. It’s absolutely delicious and I guarantee you’ll go back for seconds.
Why You’ll Love This Sautéed Cabbage
Cabbage has long been one of my favorite vegetables to cook with. It adds a delicious crunch to salads like coleslaw, becomes meltingly tender in cabbage soup, and caramelizes beautifully when it’s sautéed. The best part? This sautéed cabbage recipe only takes about 20 minutes! Making it a side dish winner. Here’s what else you’ll love about my recipe:
- It’s budget-friendly. Cabbage is a “bang for your buck” veggie, since it’s fairly inexpensive yet provides a generous amount of food.
- It can easily be jazzed up. Whether it’s adding a rainbow of sliced vegetables, crispy bacon, or other protein options, I love treating this recipe as a blank canvas. I’ll share more ideas below!
- It’s a holiday favorite. You can feed quite a few people with one head of cabbage! That makes this recipe a favorite for gatherings like Easter and St. Patrick’s Day.
Sautéed Cabbage Ingredients
- Cabbage: Grab a head of green cabbage that feels heavy in size with tightly packed leaves. When cooked through, green cabbage becomes beautifully caramelized and naturally sweet.
- Onion and Garlic: A yellow onion and a few garlic cloves add to the savory-sweet flavor.
- Ghee: My favorite method is cooking the cabbage with ghee. If you sauté too long with butter it can easily burn and olive oil doesn’t have as sweet a flavor. You can do a combination of butter and oil (the higher smoke point of the oil prevents the butter from burning). But at that point, I say just use ghee. Ghee has a high smoke point, won’t burn, and you’ll get that delicious buttery flavor.
Find the printable recipe with measurements below.
How To Sauté Cabbage
- Cook the onions and garlic. Add the ghee to a large skillet (or Dutch oven) over medium-high heat, and sauté the onions for a minute, until softened. Then, add the garlic, and stir again until fragrant.
- Add the cabbage. Add the cabbage to the skillet and sauté for 12 to 15 minutes, stirring occasionally until it becomes soft and beautifully caramelized.
- Season to taste. Sprinkle with salt and pepper, then toss to combine before serving! Note: If you’d like to see step-by-step photos, scroll below to the recipe card.
Sautéed Cabbage Variations
- Add savory flavor. Turn this into fried cabbage by adding stone ground mustard and crispy bacon bits—my personal favorite!
- Add earthy flavor. A dash of turmeric and red chili powder gives this a deliciously spiced and earthy twist.
- Mix more vegetables in. Create a more robust dish with grated carrots, sliced bell peppers, or both!
Ways To Serve
- Enjoy it as a side dish. This pairs beautifully with a variety of proteins such as crispy baked chicken thighs, meatloaf, lamb chops, pork chops, or even shepherd’s pie for an Irish-themed dinner.
- Turn it into a one-pan meal. Think cooked ground meat (chicken, turkey, or beef) or shredded meat, like pulled pork or shredded chicken.
- Make it part of breakfast. I love enjoying leftovers for breakfast alongside my chicken breakfast sausage or bacon, and eggs—whether they’re fried eggs, poached eggs, or soft-boiled eggs. More veggies for breakfast is a good thing!
More Easy Side Dishes
- Roasted Garlic Herb Potatoes: Foolproof roasted potatoes!
- Balsamic Bacon Brussels Sprouts: The best way to cook Brussels sprouts.
- Green Beans with Shallots and Lemon: My go-to green beans dish.
- Garlic Ginger Bok Choy: Perfect for Asian-inspired meals.
- Garlic Sauteed Swiss Chard: Another delicious leafy green to saute.
If you make this sauteed cabbage recipe, I’d love to hear how it turned out in the comment box below! Your review will help other readers in the community. And if you’re hungry for more healthy food inspiration and exclusive content, join my free newsletter here.
Sautéed Cabbage (Easy & Healthy)
Description
Equipment
- Le Creuset Braiser One of my favorite cast iron stovetop pans!
Ingredients
- 1 small green cabbage
- 1 small yellow onion
- 2 garlic cloves, minced
- 2 tablespoon ghee, or a blend of butter and olive oil
- kosher salt and ground black pepper, to taste
Instructions
- Slice the cabbage. Cut the cabbage in half, then into quarters. Remove the core from each piece and chop across into thin slices. Slice the onion in half and across into into thin slices.
- Cook the onions. Melt the ghee in a large skillet over medium high heat. Sauté the onions for a minute or until just starting to soften. Then add in the minced garlic and stir again.
- Cook the cabbage. Add the cabbage and saute for about 12 to 15 minutes. During this time, stir the cabbage occasionally until the cabbage becomes soft and caramelized.
- Serve. Before serving, season with salt and pepper and toss to combine.
Lisa’s Tips
- Storage tips: Let the cabbage cool completely before storing it in an airtight container in the fridge for 3 to 4 days. You can also freeze it in a freezer-safe bag or container for up to 3 months. Just keep in mind that it may soften when reheated from frozen.
- Because the cabbage may take up most of your pan, it’s easiest to stir the cabbage with tongs. You could also saute the cabbage in batches if your pan isn’t big enough. But cabbage, similar to spinach, will wilt down once it cooks.
Nutrition
©Downshiftology. Content and photographs are copyright protected. Sharing of this recipe is both encouraged and appreciated. Copying and/or pasting full recipes to any social media is strictly prohibited.
Recipe originally posted February 2020, but updated to include new photos and information for your benefit!
Came across this recipe because I wanted to make cabbage but in a yummy way. I had recently started on the Candida cleanse and I needed it find a way to love cabbage. The ingredients were and clean and definitely candida friendly. I’m glad it gave it a try! It was delicious. I added Celtic salt and pepper. Drizzled with some olive oil at the end. Thank you for sharing!
Happy to hear this sauteed cabbage was exactly what you were looking for, Amy!
I’m looking for a “dish to pass” option for a party where the host is serving corned beef. Is this something that has to be warm when eating? If so, can it hold up to being in a crock pot on the warm setting?
Hi Kari – I do think this recipe is best warm, though it can also be served at room temperature. And yes, it can hold up in a crockpot as well.
This was really delicious! I am dairy free and made this with olive oil instead of ghee. Even my picky 15 year old pronounced it really good and said “you should add this to the dinner rotation”. The caramelized onions added a lot of flavor. We both agreed this dish is more than the sum of it’s parts.
Hi Elizabeth – Happy to hear both you and your 15 year old loved this sauteed cabbage dish! The onions make all the difference for flavor.
This is by far my favorite way to make cabbage! I am not a fan of boiled or braised cabbage so I was excited to try this. I added some pancetta I had leftover from another recipe and it all cooked up beautifully with tons of flavor and tender texture. My whole family loved it!
Hi Adrienne – The additional pancetta must have tasted SO good with this sauteed cabbage dish! Glad the whole family enjoyed this recipe.
I have enjoyed cabbage forever and experimented with lots of other veggies.
My additions are the carrot, Potatoes and onions for flavourful cabbage soup. OR
The other is the cabbage added to tiny meatballs and made into soups.
Freezing is my favorite pastime, making it easy to eat healthy when in a hurry.
Cabbage is definitely a versatile ingredient in the way it can be incorporated into many different meals! I hope you enjoy this simple sauteed cabbage recipe!
This is delicious thank you! My grandma always used white pepper. A game changer! It’s hard to find in the local shops here so we always use black pepper like above.
Hi Frankie – Glad you’re loving this sauteed cabbage dish! I’m sure it would taste amazing with white pepper as well.
So easy and so yummy! I love the idea of this simple and quick cabbage side dish. My man doesn’t like boiled cabbage so this is a great way of incorporating cabbage’s magical low carb and high fibre combo in our diet.
Yes, it really is a great side dish option. Enjoy!
I added freshly ground caraway seed. I love caraway with cabbage!
Sounds delicious, Lisa! Glad you enjoyed this recipe with fresh caraway seeds.
I love this dish and add lightly toasted caraway seeds during the onion/garlic sauté.
Great idea on adding caraway seeds into the mix, Hillary!
My favourite spice with stir-fried cabbage is caraway. Freshly ground is best, but who seeds are OK too
I’m sure this sauteed cabbage tasted amazing with caraway spice! Enjoy, Howard.
Can you make this with red and green cabbage? Curious if it would taste just as good and maybe look more colorful.
Yes, you can use any color of cabbage!
can you use red cabbage instead?
Yes, no problem!
I was amazed how great this recipe was! Simple but delicious I used red onion because that’s what was on hand and I sliced my garlic. Thank you 😊
Simple and delicious is always a winning combo in my opinion. :)
It was a simple recipe. I’m following the Glycose Goddess to turn around my blood sugar levels; you eat a green starter ahead of your main meal.
I needed inspo tonight. This was new to me and it tasted more, and better, than just the ingredients. It was delicious.
Happy to hear you found a delicious way to get more greens into your meal with this sauteed cabbage, Rosey!
Delicious! Used EVOO + butter. Threw in leftover pulled pork and it was a meal in itself. This will be in our rotation for vegetables sides. Thank you!
What a great way to use your leftover pulled pork, Minda! Glad this sauteed cabbage was the perfect pairing.
Had to use olive oil instead of butter (dietary issues), but delicious nonetheless!
Hi Dena – Glad this sauteed cabbage still turned out great with olive oil!
We love to use this in place of high carb pasta with a thick meat sauce. Did not care for cabbage before we started to make it this way.
Hi Cheryl – Happy to hear this recipe has changed your mind about cabbage!
Can you make this in advance and reheat it?
Hi Cyn – Absolutely! This reheats beautifully.
Just made this, can’t wait to eat! Simple yet delicious and healthy.
I have made this a couple of times and added some chopped pork tenderloin (just to use up) and it was delicious!! It’s delicious just as is, but the pork made it a meal.
Hi Judi – I’m so glad you enjoyed this fried cabbage.