How do I retain the deep red/purple colour when cooking red cabbage ?

If you are making sweet and sour red cabbage, use plum jelly for your sweetener.
How do I retain the deep red/purple colour when cooking red cabbage ?
a touch of lemon juice. I know this keeps the vibrant green vegs bright but would assume it will do cabbage nicely as well. Just a tiny squirt is all thats needed.
Reply:The red color in cabbage (and several other fruits, cherries, strawberries, currents, raspberries) is due to a pigment called anthocyanin. (beets are a different pigment). Anthocyanin are extremely pH sensitive. In fact if you take cabbage juice and raise the pH it will turn blue! So the best way to retain the red color is to keep it slightly acidic. You can do this with lemon juice, vinegar, citric acid, tartaric acid etc. Of course heating the pigment during cooking tends to degrade it so my suggestion isn't perfect. Natural food pigments was my PhD Thesis. Good Luck.



PhD Food Chemistry and Nutrition
Reply:Steaming them in a pot steamer.