Buttered Skillet Napa Cabbage Recipe

Best Napa cabbage recipe buttered in a skillet is here! Simple vegetable side dish we all love plus more Napa cabbage recipes you can make throughout the week.

Recipes with Napa Cabbage

My favorite way to cook this green veggie, or the harder variety, is to make a version of buttered cabbage. It is just as what it says, it’s made tender and sauteed with butter and seasonings. For this one we cook cabbage on the stove in a skillet. I will go over other methods below too but everyone has this appliance so we are starting with the basics.

If you wanted to use a Dutch Oven that works well too, especially if you want to double it. You’d need a larger pot for that and you need some room to stir and fold in all the goodness. I’d follow our fried cabbage recipe for that one, it is fabulous. We make it mild but you could amp it up and make it spicy with red pepper flakes too.

Buttered Cabbage

I make this often to serve with dinner especially if this is on sale. My husband recently has figured out he is lactose intolerant so I have to alter his. There is a way to make dairy free buttered cabbage with a plant based alternative. You can typically find it all over at grocery stores now and it’s pretty close to the real thing. Add meat and make Fried Cabbage and Bacon, both are great. You will need;

• 1 head Napa cabbage sliced, also called Chinese cabbage
• Salted butter
• 2 tbsp olive oil, or half sesame oil
• Minced garlic
• 1 tsp apple cider vinegar or rice vinegar
• 3 tbsp chicken broth or water
• Salt and pepper

If you need or want just uber simple you can just go with the butter, salt and pepper and that is it. I mean it is best with all the other things and I prefer broth to water in order to steam it to tender. It will add a lot more flavor for sure and you will need liquid for it to wilt to your liking.

I don’t like it too too soft, a little bit of “bite” to it is a must as far as texture is concerned. It’s a fine balance so you do really need to pay attention to it in the pan as opposed to making Instant Pot cabbage. For those you will need to make sure you quick release the steam at the end but you can walk away and just let it cook without your attention.

Skillet Cabbage

You can use a large or cast iron skillet for this. There are many ways of how to cut cabbage but for this shredded in large cuts like you see here is best. The larger or thicker your pieces are the longer it will take to break it down and get it soft. Alternatively you could cube it into large bite size squares but this is a bit easier to eat I think.

I use the same size/method to make our slow cooker cabbage. If you want to throw and go everything in in the morning I would go with that method of cooking. Gives it a longer time to soak in all the flavors in there and literally needs NO attention from you throughout the day. This is what you’ll do for this one;

• Prep the cabbage by slicing in half lengthwise. 
• Slice into thin strips. Set aside for now. In a large skillet, begin to heat the oil and minced garlic over medium high heat. 
• Once the garlic is fragrant add cabbage, along with water or broth will give it more flavor.
• Saute for 3-4 minutes, stirring occasionally until the cabbage is slightly wilted.
• Stir in butter, vinegar, salt & pepper. 

Continue to saute until cabbage is tender and cooked to your preference (approximately 3-4 minutes). Remove from heat and serve. This will take about 15 minutes total, depending on the texture you want. Occasionally I will add a bit of soy sauce and sesame seeds if I am serving this with an Asian main dish or something.

How to Cook Napa Cabbage

But wait…..there’s more. 😉 You basically can use any of our other easy cabbage recipes using this type. The biggest difference is this doesn’t take quite as long as green, and a lot less time vs. red cabbage recipes. For other ideas I would highly recommend making our slow cooker stuffed cabbage, but decrease the cooking time by 2 hours.

If you do have a pressure cooker I would definitely make our Instant Pot fried cabbage with this. I have also used both Napa and regular green cabbage mixed together for a great texture mix. You can add it into a number of different dishes though too. Let’s go with adding beef into the mix shall we?

Cabbage stew, if you haven’t made this yet you need to! Using stew meat and other vegetables too you can thicken the sauce to make a sort of gravy or leave as more like a soup.

Sautéed napa cabbage

If you wanted to make this into a stir fry you totally could too. Add small diced precooked beef or chicken with other delicate choices like bok choy into the pan at the beginning.