If you’re trying to eat from a veggie garden or from an allotment (box scheme, etc), you’ll discover that in the wintertime, your options for salads differ from supermarket fare. And that might be a good thing. There are some really healthy foods that many of us have forgotten about, or never learned to cook with.

On their list of the 11 best foods you aren’t eating, the New York Times (via Men’s Health) highlights beets, swiss chard, pumpkin seeds and cabbage. It just so happens that my mother-in-law sent me home with a head of the stuff this weekend and I realized I’d never used it in my kitchen.

Why should we bring cabbage into our diets? Besides the fact, that it’s a great way to eat seasonally, it’s also a very healthy food. As part of the Cruciferae family of vegetables (aka crucifers. Also includes broccoli, kale, cauliflower and Brussels sprouts), it’s been related to lowered risks of many cancers. It’s also high in iron, potassium, calcium and vitamins B1, B2 and B3.

Since cooking it tends to lower its nutritional value, I decided to turn my head of green cabbage into a salad. In this video, I make my own variation of a coleslaw with just what I could find in my kitchen: 1 lemon, vinegar, olive oil, salt pepper, a carrot, fresh parsley, brown sugar and that head of green cabbage. (For recipe, see eco-DIY A winter salad recipe: coleslaw)