Could be from Kansas, could be from Nebraska, is there any real difference? Most agree Runza is a German-American immigrant comfort food made with hamburger and cabbage. Serves 9 yuppies or 3 hungry cowboys. This is a great dish to serve on poker night along with a side of Ratatouille.
Ingredients
- 1 lb Ground beef – thawed
- 1 Onion – diced
- 2 cups Cabbage – sliced into ribbons
- 1 cup Chedder cheese – shredded
- 1 cup Mozzarella cheese – shredded
- 1 cup Mushrooms – sliced
- 2 8 oz tubes of crescent roll dough
- 2 TBL Butter
- Bechemal Sauce
- 3 TBL Butter
- 3 TBL Flour
- 8 oz Whole milk
- 1 tsp Kosher salt
- 0.5 tsp Black Pepper
- 0.5 tsp Garlic Powder
Process
- Mise en Place – Measure and prepare the ingredients prior to starting.
- Preheat oven to 350 F (175 C).
- Warm a skillet on Med heat then add butter. Once melted add hamburger and cook until browned.
- Add onion, mushrooms and cook until onions and shrooms are softened (~4 mins).
- Add salt, pepper, garlic powder, and cabbage and cook until tender (~5 mins).
- Remove from skillet and set aside.
- Make Bechemal Sauce.
- Melt butter in the skillet.
- Mix in flour and let cook until flour is lightly toasted.
- In a series of steps add 2 oz of milk and stir until all the lumps are smoothed out. At first the roux will get real dry but after a couple of iterations of adding milk it will become a nice sauce.
- Mix roux with hamburger until evenly integrated.
- Open one tube of crescent dough and arrange in a 13×9″ baking dish so the edges touch.
- Bake crescents for 5 mins or until lightly baked.
- Spread hamburger mixture on top of crescents, cover with cheese.
- Open second tube of crescent dough and arrange on top of cheese so edges all touch. Recommend poking the dough with a fork to allow steam to escape (like you would do for a pie crust).
- Bake until top is golden brown (~25 mins).
- Let cool 10 mins before cutting into 9 even sized squares. If you serve too soon, the internal mixture will run, and the cheese could burn your mouth.
