... almost. You also need a bundle of dry thyme. You put the thyme in the pot, cover it with 1-2 cabbage leaves, build up the stuffed cabbge rolls, interleaving the bay leaves - 2-3 should be enough, 6-8 I think is too much - and sprinkle some unground black pepper across. At the end you cover with another few cabbage leaves, add a glass of white wine, a cup of tomato sauce, add water until it shows up at the top, but the cabbage rolls don't float.

And _then_ you start cooking it, on the slowest setting your cooktop has, ideally for 34- hours at least. It's the very slow cooking that allows all flavors to develop and to combine into a rightout magical taste. You can cook them in one hour at higher heat, but this way there's a good chance they'll taste like paper.

Also, not all meat you add should be smoked. The pork neck can be fresh, if the bacon is right. Nitrites used when preparing the bacon, while not necessarily the healthiest, are OK for taste. Sugar or dextrose aren't. Rice ... Idunno, I regularly use white rice with short and round grain - it becomes pastier while cooking, and blends better with the rest of the ingredients.

Also, if you can't pickled cabbage without vinegar, try fresh cabbage. Vinegar completely damages the taste. If you use fresh cabbage, boil the leaves for two minutes, and slice away the thicker parts, or else the leaves will break when you try to roll them.