How Ina Garten Turns Cabbage Into An Entertainment Centerpiece

A festive centerpiece is an eye-catching and welcome addition to the table, inviting people to gather and enjoy food together. Often, they're created from decorative flowers and other embellishments that generally aren't intended to be eaten. That's totally fine, but wouldn't be interesting — and inspiring — if a centerpiece actually were edible? And even better — what if it were constructed from seasonal ingredients that featured in your meal?

Ina Garten fame has worked just such entertaining magic, elevating the humble and oft-overlooked cabbage to Insta-worthy heights. We're not surprised; after all, she was a government worker long before she became a celebrity chef with a major TV show and one of the best-selling cookbook authors of 1999, per Insider. Garten has gorgeous taste in food and decorating (per Food Network) — consider us influenced. 

To follow Garten's suit, follow up the centerpiece with seasonal brassica dishes, and try experimenting with different "edimentals."

In a November 4 Instagram post, Ina Garten showcased a stunning and clever bouquet of cabbage stalks arranged artfully in a glass vase. The white, purple, and green leaves and stems pop against the backdrop of her white marble countertop and the airy, light colors of her kitchen space. The cabbage adds a rustic, seasonal touch, nodding to the early fall season when cabbage plants thrive.

And if you're taken aback by the cabbage's unexpectedly elegant appearance, know that it actually comes from the same species of plant as broccoli, cauliflower, Brussels sprouts, kale, kohlrabi, and more, according to MasterClass. 

That special plant is Brassica oleracea, and we're blessed with such bounty from countless decades of selectively breeding the plant for specific qualities. In cabbage, that's the big, bunchy, hardy leaves that are as beautiful as flower petals in the varieties Garten shared on Instagram.

Recreating Ina Garten's cabbage masterpiece is simple. You'll just need cabbage stalks — check the farmer's market. At garden stores, you'll find ornamental brassicas, but they may taste bitter compared to their culinary counterparts, the University of Wisconsin-Madison warns. Then, you'll be free to make Garten's sautéed cabbage, winter slaw, and vegetable coleslaw. 

With so many delicious vegetables in the Brassica family, you have plenty of other worthy materials for your arrangements, too. Brussels sprouts are sometimes sold on the stalk; you can decorate your dining room and then make Garten's balsamic-roasted Brussels sprouts to go with her signature perfect roast chicken. There are also collard greens, which come in blue-green and white-striped varieties. And don't even get us started on all of the fantastic shades of cauliflower, as described by Cook's Illustrated. You'll wow guests with its appearance and seal the deal with a crowd-pleasing recipe for Korean air fried cauliflower afterward (they do say we eat with our eyes first, after all). 

Nearly everyone's heard of edible flowers by now; there are violets, calendula, nasturtiums, sunflowers, and more. Other types of vegetables and herbs you can use for centerpieces include colorful red and rainbow chard, rhubarb, sorrel, lemongrass, bunched thyme, and rosemary stalks. Centerpieces can be more than just a part of the ambience — why not make them part of the dish?