Holubtsi vs Gołąbki: One Cabbage Roll, Two Names

Part of our Heritage Kitchen Glossary – short guides to the ingredients and techniques behind Eastern European cooking.

Put a plate of holubtsi next to a plate of gołąbki and they look like the same dish. Both are cabbage leaves softened in boiling water, wrapped around minced pork and rice and slow-cooked in tomato sauce. Both names mean the same thing: little pigeons. They differ mainly in the sauce and the seasoning, and further back in time, in the filling.

Two names, one bird

Ukrainian holub and Polish gołąb both mean pigeon. A rolled leaf is thought to resemble a dove’s breast. A guesthouse host in Zhytomyr region tells the name as a story: birds were once wrapped in cabbage leaves so they wouldn’t burn on the fire, and later cooks put a filling in the leaf instead. It is best read as a folk story rather than documented history.

Where it came from

Stuffed cabbage is cooked all over Central and Eastern Europe and the Middle East, and further south grape leaves take the cabbage’s place. Culture.pl, run by Poland’s Adam Mickiewicz Institute, says it isn’t clear whether Poland got gołąbki from Turkish, Armenian or Jewish cooking; the dish first shows up in 19th-century cookbooks from the Eastern Borderlands (Kresy, the former eastern lands of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth). In Ukraine, holubtsi were first filled with millet, buckwheat, corn or potatoes, and rice mixed with meat came into use only in the twentieth century. In 2023 Ukraine’s Ministry of Culture added the preparation of holubtsi to the national list of intangible cultural heritage.

Where they part company

The sauce is the clearest divide. Ukrainian holubtsi cook in a tomato sauce, sometimes with sour cream stirred in, while Polish gołąbki go into a tomato or mushroom sauce. Polish cooks usually season the filling with dried marjoram, and Ukrainian recipes add a carrot alongside the onion.

Then there is the wrapper. Both start from fresh cabbage, and both have a sour version. In the Polish Borderlands, rolls were sometimes made with leaves from whole fermented cabbage heads, and an early 20th-century cookbook calls these sour rolls “ruskie,” after the historical region of Ruthenia. Ukrainian cooks use whole sauerkraut leaves put up for winter, and in Vinnytsia region they also roll the filling in beet greens, grape leaves and, in hard times, even horseradish leaves. In southern Odesa region, grape-leaf holubtsi with rice and pork are called sarmale.

Rice is the grain of the modern version of both. In Vinnytsia region millet is still the base grain, and rice counts as the newer filling. On the Polish side, an early Borderlands cookbook fills the rolls with groats or rice, and after 1945 people resettled from the Borderlands brought gołąbki of buckwheat groats, potatoes and meat with them.

The meatless versions

The older meatless habit survives at Christmas. The holy supper of Sviat Vechir, Ukrainian Christmas Eve, is a meal of twelve dishes with no meat and no milk, and lenten holubtsi for it are filled with rice, millet or buckwheat, sometimes with dried mushrooms or fried onion. Polish Wigilia is also a meatless meal, and gołąbki come to it only in a meatless form, filled with buckwheat and mushrooms.

The third cousin

Jewish holishkes take their name from the same Slavic word for dove. They are usually made with ground beef and rice, and the tomato sauce is made sweet and sour with brown sugar and lemon juice. Stuffed cabbage is tied to Sukkot, the autumn harvest festival, when cabbage was cheap and in season. In Romania, Bessarabia and southern Ukraine the dish was called prakes, from the Turkish yaprak, “leaf.”

Which one to cook

For a tomato sauce with sour cream, cook holubtsi; the lighter version uses turkey and brown rice and keeps the same slow cooking in tomato sauce. For marjoram in the filling and a tomato sauce without sour cream, cook gołąbki, with a turkey and brown rice version if you want it leaner, or the meatless buckwheat version for Wigilia. Gołąbki are said to taste best on the second or third day, and both keep in the fridge in their sauce for a few days, so either can be made ahead. A leaf that tears can be patched with a piece of a spare leaf.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the difference between holubtsi and golabki?

They are the same dish under two names, both meaning little pigeons. The main differences are in the sauce and the seasoning: Ukrainian holubtsi cook in a tomato sauce, sometimes with sour cream stirred in, while Polish golabki go into a tomato or mushroom sauce and the filling is seasoned with marjoram. Ukrainian recipes also add a carrot alongside the onion.

Why are stuffed cabbage rolls named after pigeons?

Ukrainian holub and Polish golab both mean pigeon. A rolled leaf is thought to resemble a dove’s breast, and a folk story from Zhytomyr region says birds were once wrapped in cabbage leaves so they would not burn on the fire. The story is best read as folklore rather than documented history.

Are holishkes the same as holubtsi?

They share the same word root, the Slavic word for dove, but the sauce is different. Ashkenazi Jewish holishkes are usually made with ground beef and rice in a tomato sauce made sweet and sour with brown sugar and lemon juice. Stuffed cabbage is tied to Sukkot, the autumn harvest festival. Families from Romania, Bessarabia and southern Ukraine called the dish prakes, from the Turkish word yaprak, meaning leaf.

Were cabbage rolls always made with meat?

No. Older Ukrainian fillings were millet, buckwheat, corn or potatoes, and rice mixed with meat came into use only in the twentieth century. Meatless versions are still made for the Christmas Eve supper in both countries: with rice, millet or buckwheat in Ukraine, with buckwheat and mushrooms in Poland.

Which one takes less time?

Golabki are a little quicker: about 2 to 2½ hours in all, with around an hour in the oven. Holubtsi take about 2½ to 3 hours, with 1½ to 2 hours of covered cooking. Both can be made a day ahead and reheated.