Massaged Kale Salad

Massaged Kale Salad

This recipe was adapted from Aarti Sequeira's (Aarti Party, Food Network) recipe, found here.

Ingredients:

• 1 bunch kale (black kale is especially good), stalks removed and discarded, leaves thinly sliced


• 1 lemon, juiced


• 1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil, plus extra for drizzling


• Kosher salt


• 2 teaspoons honey


• Freshly ground black pepper


• 1 mango, diced small (about 1 cup)


• Small handful toasted pepitas (pumpkin seeds), about 2 rounded tablespoons

Directions:

In large serving bowl, add the kale, half of lemon juice, a drizzle of oil and a little kosher salt. Massage until the kale starts to soften and wilt, 2 to 3 minutes. Set aside while you make the dressing.

In a small bowl, whisk remaining lemon juice with the honey and lots of freshly ground black pepper. Stream in the 1/4 cup of oil while whisking until dressing forms, and you like how it tastes.

Pour the dressing over the kale, and add the mango and pepitas. Toss and serve.

Adrienne's Notes: There's no need to remove the stalks on these little baby kale. I couldn't find pumpkin seeds at the grocery store, so I substituted toasted walnuts (toasted in the oven at 375 degrees until fragrant, about ten minutes). I also bought a mango that turned out to be brown on the inside, even though it was firm and only starting to turn red and orange on the outside. Bummers, huh? So I substituted strawberries there. I wanted to use a substitute fruit that would match the texture of the mango and fit in with the citrusy dressing. Both substitutions worked well! I'm sure the original recipe is delicious, too. Massaging the kale in the lemon acid and olive oil is the secret. This softens the leaves up and takes away some of their bitterness. I must have eaten about four cups of kale this way (it shrank down after the massage). In the short time during which I've experimented with kale, this is the BEST way to have it! And it's raw. Bonus!

Above: kale salad, take two. This time, I found a good mango and pepitas (pumpkin seeds). The salad is good, but I wouldn't use pumpkin seeds next time-- they're too chewy. I'd use macadamia nuts.

Baby Kale Chips

Baby Kale Chips

A few weeks ago, we made kale chips with the big lacinato kale leaves. Here's that recipe. This week, we got more bags of the "Powerhouse Kale Mix," which consists of a variety of baby kale leaves. Baby kale leaves also make delicious chips. As you can see from the pictures above, the kale shrinks by more than half while in the oven. The resulting baby kale chip is parchment thin and translucent. Here's the recipe, from the blog "The Hunger Struck":

Ingredients:

A small bag of fresh mixed baby kales

olive oil

fleur de sel

Directions:

Preheat your oven to 300 degrees

Wash your kales under cold water and make sure to dry thoroughly. I use a salad spinner to get them quite dry and them let then sit on a paper towel for a while until there is not a drop of water on them.

In a bowl toss the kale in a little olive oil and then arrange on a baking sheet in a single layer. Sprinkle with fleur de sel.

Bake for 25 minutes or until completely crisp.

Serve immediately.

Powerhouse Kale Mix Pesto and Pasta Recipes

Powerhouse Kale Mix Pesto

This recipe comes from FarmAid's website, Homegrown.org. The link to the original page is above.

Ingredients:

One bunch fresh kale (local and organic if you can)

1/2 C. nuts - (note: I'm not a big fan of pine nuts, so I use a mix of roasted salted almonds and cashews. You should feel free to use pine nuts **shudder** or walnuts or hazelnuts or whatever nuts you've got in the cupboard.)

1/4-1/2 C. Extra virgin olive oil

4-6 cloves fresh garlic

Juice of 1/2 lemon (optional)

1/2 C. ground Parmesan cheese (you can leave the cheese out if you're making vegan pesto or if you're freezing for future use. Add cheese after thawing.)

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Directions

1. Start with a pile of fresh, washed kale that has been stripped from the stems. Save the stems for soup or stir fry.

2. Peel and trim 4-6 cloves of garlic.

3. Chop: 3/4 C. of nuts in a food processor until it resembles, um... this: (NOTE: The original post shows nuts and garlic in a rough chop).

4. Add 1/4 C. of extra-virgin olive oil, garlic and cheese and lemon juice (if using) and process again until it all reaches a similar consistency - but not long enough to make a funky nut butter consistency.

5. Blanch: Toss kale into 2 quarts of salted water that has reached a rolling boil. Continue cooking until water returns to boiling and kale has softened a bit.

6. Refresh: Move the kale from the pot to a colander and rinse with cold water until greens are cool to the touch. Using your hands, squeeze the water from the kale and place into the food processor.

7. Process once more until it looks like pesto, adding more olive oil for consistency, and salt and pepper to taste.

8. Serve as a pasta accessory (natch) or as a sandwich condiment, zingy dip for vegetables, or any way you add an earthy, garlicy, nutty flavor to something. Enjoy!

NOTE: I like pine nuts. I used walnuts, though. Also, 4 to 6 cloves of garlic in this recipe was too much because my garlic cloves were HUGE. I used a whole bag of MA`O Farms powerhouse kale mix for this pesto.

Maltagliati in Powerhouse Kale Pesto-Cream Sauce with Toasted Pine Nuts and Parmiggiano Reggiano (my recipe)

Because the powerhouse kale pesto was so garlicky, I decided to cook it into a cream sauce to mellow out the zing.

Ingredients:

Leftover lasagne noodles (I used five long noodles)
1/4 cup heavy cream
2 tbsp powerhouse kale pesto
1/4 cup pine nuts
1/4 cup grated Parmiggiano Reggiano
Salt and pepper to taste

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. When oven is ready, toast pine nuts in a single layer until they just start to turn golden brown. Be prepared to take them out quickly, because the point at which they start to turn color and the point at which they scorch are close in time. Set aside.

2. In a pot of boiling, salted water, cook the lasagne noodles according to the package directions. Have a bowl of water and ice ready to receive and cool the cooked lasagne noodles. Cut the lasagne noodles into haphazard shapes. This is my version of "maltagliati," or "poorly cut" pasta.

3. Over medium heat, pour heavy cream into a saute pan. Bring to a boil, then bring down to a simmer, stirring so that a skin doesn't form and so that the cream doesn't scald. When the cream has thickened, stir in the powerhouse kale pesto mix. Salt and pepper the sauce to taste.

4. Toss the pasta in the cream sauce. Top with the toasted pine nuts and the parmiggiano reggiano.

NOTE: Adding chunks of chicken would work in this recipe, too.