Vegan Cabbage Rolls

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These Vegan Cabbage Rolls are stuffed with rice, lentils and vegetables, making them a healthy and filling meal that's packed with flavor and nutrients. They're a vegetarian twist on a classic cabbage roll with the same heartiness!

Overhead of the finished vegan cabbage rolls in a blue baking dish. — Stuffed with rice and vegetables, these vegan cabbage rolls are a delicious and filling dinner.

Stuffed cabbage or cabbage rolls are typically stuffed with cabbage or beef. To make this recipe vegan, we replaced the meat with lentils, which makes these cabbage rolls meatless but keeps them hearty and filling. It's vegan comfort food that makes for the perfect weeknight dinner!

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Why We Love This Recipe
Ingredients
Ingredient Notes
How to Make Vegan Cabbage Rolls
Serving Ideas
Tips and FAQs
Related Recipes
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Why We Love This Recipe

Versatile and easy to customize: The beauty of any stuffed food is that you can customize what's inside the rolls to your liking. Not a fan of lentils? Use chickpeas or peas or beans instead. Don't like carrots? Just use a different vegetable!
Great to make ahead: These vegan cabbage rolls freeze really well, so you can make them ahead of time, freeze, and cook when you're ready!
Hearty and filling: Sometimes vegan or vegetarian dinners aren't super filling, but these cabbage rolls are definitely an exception. With lentils, rice, and veggies, they're packed with nutrient-dense ingredients.

Ingredients

Here's what you'll need to make these vegan cabbage rolls:

Ingredient Notes

Cabbage: We used green cabbage in this recipe, since its leave are more pliable and easy to roll up than the leaves of a purple cabbage. If you can't find a nice green cabbage, you could also try savoy cabbage. When you're looking to nab the perfect cabbage at the store, here are some things to look out for:
- Color: look for a vibrant green color
- Firmness: the perfect cabbage will be dense and firm, not spongy
- Size and weight: should be heavy for its size, which means it's still full of moisture
- Outer leaves: should be free from large blemishes
Lentils: We used fully cooked brown lentils, which are the most common variety, but can become a bit mushy if overcooked. You could also try green lentils, which are a bit firmer, or red lentils, which are on the softer size and have a less earth flavor than their brown or green counterparts.
- If you would prefer a more classic cabbage roll, sub lentils with vegan ground beef (like Impossible Foods).
Tomato sauce: The cabbage rolls are slathered with, and cooked on top of a bed of tomato sauce, so make sure you're using a relatively high quality sauce as the flavor will come through.
Rice: We used fully cooked white rice, but you can also use brown rice.
Salt: Use kosher salt, not table salt, to ensure your rolls don't end up being too salty.
Italian seasoning: We use a blend because it's easier than measuring out several different herbs. If you don't have any of the blend, you can also use 1 teaspoon total of a mixture of dried basil, parsley and oregano instead.

How to Make Vegan Cabbage Rolls

STEP 1 Preheat the oven to 350˚F / 175˚C and bring a large pot of water to a boil (large enough to fit the cabbage). Core the cabbage with a pairing knife by making 4 incisions to cut out a pyramid-shaped piece of the thickest part of the core.

While you wait for the water to boil, cook the rice according to package directions.

STEP 2 Add oil to a large sauté pan over medium heat. Add the onion and cook for 5 minutes, then stir in the garlic and cook for an additional 2 minutes.

On the left: cored cabbage. On the right: cooking onions. — Core the cabbage and start sautéing onions.

STEP 3 Stir in the tomato paste, carrot, parsley, rice, lentils, Italian seasoning blend, salt, and pepper. Set the rice and lentil mixture aside.

To prepare the sauce (not pictured), add 2 tablespoons of oil to a medium saucepan over medium heat. Add onion and garlic and cook for 5 minutes, stirring throughout, then pour in tomato sauce and red wine vinegar. Add in parsley, sugar, Italian seasoning, salt, and pepper, then simmer on low for 15 minutes.

On the left: adding carrots to onions. On the right: adding lentils to onion and carrot mixture. — Add in tomato paste, carrots, rice, lentils, and seasonings.

STEP 4: Add the cabbage to the boiling water and cook for 5 minutes, making sure to flip the cabbage halfway through. Remove the cabbage from the boiling water and move to a large bowl filled with ice for 2 minutes. This will halt the cooking process. After 2 minutes, move cabbage to a colander and let it drain for 10 minutes.

Gently pull off 12 leaves and pat each one dry. Remove thickest part of each leaf by cutting a V-shaped portion of the leaf out (see picture below).

On the left: boiled cabbage draining out in a colander. On the right: leaf removed from cabbage. — Make sure to cut out the thick bottom portion of each leaf, otherwise the leaf won't roll.

STEP 5: Add 2-3 tablespoons of filling to each leaf and roll them up (like a burrito).

Four panel view of rolling up a cabbage leaf with filling like a burrito. — Roll up each leaf like a burrito.

STEP 6: Reserve ⅓ cup of sauce and pour the rest of the sauce into a 9" x 13" pan. Lay the cabbage rolls seam side down in the pan and pack them together tightly so they don’t unroll while baking. Pour the rest of the sauce over the rolls.

STEP 7: Bake for 50-55 minutes.

Three panel view of laying down sauce in an oval pan, adding cabbage rolls, and the final cooked version. — Add sauce to the bottom of the pan and atop the rolls for maximum flavor.

Serving Ideas

Serve our vegan cabbage rolls with bread of your choice for a simple meal. We personally love them with our vegan garlic bread!)
Serve with a light and refreshing salad:
Serve your cabbage rolls over mashed potatoes or creamy polenta.
Enjoy with a side of our favorite herb roasted potatoes.

Tips and FAQs

Make ahead: It's super easy to prep the rice mixture and the sauce in advance, then refrigerate them until you're ready eat. You can then prep, stuff, and cook the cabbage.
Easy to freeze: You can prep everything, then freeze the finished rolls in an airtight container along with the sauce. Let them thaw out overnight, and then cook them the next day.
Storage: Store leftovers in the refrigerator for up to 5 days.
Cabbage tends to pop up out of the water while cooking. To prevent this, you can try topping your pot with a lid.. The buoyant cabbage should pop up against the lid and remain motionless. You can also put a large bowl over the cabbage to ensure enough of it is submerged.

Can I use purple cabbage instead of green cabbage?

We recommend using green cabbage since its leaves have the perfect pliability for rolling up, whereas purple or red cabbage can bit a bit stiffer and harder to roll. If you're looking for a substitute, you can try savoy cabbage.