While much of the nation is dealing with an abundance of zucchini and tomatoes, my most prolific crop at the moment is kale. As someone who doesn’t love cooked greens, this is a bit of a dilemma. My chickens get the leaves that succumb to bugs, but that still leaves me with a windfall of two varieties of vitamin-rich green leaves. Turns out I’m not the only one trying to figure out how to deal with prolific kale plants. On Facebook, Tina asked:
Can you post kale recipes? I don’t have a clue what to do with it other than feed it to chickens.
Let me tell you how I’m utilizing it. First and foremost, it goes in everything. I strip out the main stem, cut the leaf into small shreds, and then:
- Saute the leaves with a bit of olive oil and garlic until they’re tender, then add eggs for a breakfast scramble. I use two leaves for three eggs. No use overdoing it and making everyone hate kale.
- Stir into marinara sauce. Kale disappears beautifully in marinara sauce – I use 6-8 leaves for a big stock pot. The people who don’t love kale don’t even know it’s there.
- Ditto for soups. I’ve stirred it into minestrone style vegetable soups and cream based chowders with equal success.
- Add two or three leaves to a green salad.
- Toss several leaves into the pot when you’re making chicken or beef stock.
- Add a leaf or two to fruit smoothies.
Olive oil, lemon juice, Bragg’s aminos, any dried fruit like cherries or cranberries if you like, any nuts like pecan, almond, pine; can add fresh crunchy fruit like apples or pears. I start out by squeezing some lemon over the cut kale and lomi’ing [massaging] it a bit to soften the kale. Then a round of olive oil and some Bragg’s. Add avocado [about half] and lomi again [the avocado becomes part of the dressing - not chunks]. Then add the bonus ingredients. Taste and adjust if necessary….
When I shared this method of preserving kale on Facebook, Darci said that she’s used that technique and substituted kale for basil in a pesto recipe and gives it thumbs up. (Her exact words were, “Supah ʻono!!”)
What’s your favorite way to prepare kale? I’d love it if you’d share recipes – or links to recipes – so we can all expand our repertoire.
If you have a juicer, it’s awesome at mowing through kale. Juice 8-10 leaves with 1 granny smith apple, a 1/2-inch knob of ginger, 1/2 lemon, and any other add-ins – cucumber, celery, carrots, beets – you want. You’ll never taste the kale, I promise.
Massaging kale makes an amazing salad. I use olive oil rather than lemon. I also recommend trying green smoothies. Kate, mint, water, and frozen banana. Yum!
I make kale chips all the time, but now I’ve got to make the cheesy ones!!!