Here are 15 kale recipes to make you too fall in love with leafy greens!
Kale is definitely my favorite vegetable, with good reason. This leafy green is a member of the Brassica family, which also includes mustard greens, turnips, collard greens, broccoli, cabbage, cauliflower and even wasabi! This family is known for its wonderfully broad nutritional profile– it’s quite literally one of the best things you can put into your body.
Kale is a great source of iron, fiber, calcium, micronutrients, high in carotenoids and other anti-oxidants, and is well-known for its powerful healing properties due to its high sulfur content. Not only that, it tastes great raw, cooked, blended, or juiced. In her lovely garden + food book, Vegetable Literacy, Deborah Madison notes in her specifically eloquent way, “as with other challenging cruciferous plants, [kale] is one of the vegetables we should enjoy eating.” Here are 15 kale recipes to encourage you to enjoy this fabulous green.
The favorite green in my kitchen is dark, elegant lacinato kale, but any variety will work with all the kale recipes here. Be sure to choose leaves that are vibrantly green, slightly squeaky (see my kale salad video to see what this sounds like!), and free of the little bugs that sometimes hide themselves in the leaves: kale leaves are often home to aphids and the spiders that eat them, and there also might be some soil on the leaves.
To keep your kale super fresh, once home from the market or store, place your bunch of kale upright in a glass of water (like you would for cut flowers). This helps the leaves spring back to life and ensure longevity in the refrigerator; sometimes the kale needs just an hour, sometimes longer. If it’s very hot outside, be sure to keep an eye on them so they don’t wilt! Then rinse the leaves in cool water, and store in a container or bag in your fridge. If it’s from a healthy plant, the kale will continue to plump up, and will likely remain fresh for about a week with this extra step.
Enjoy the green goodness, friends!
4. Kale Salad w/ Roasted Vegetables
9. Coconut Miso Chickpeas with Kale
10. Green Smoothies, courtesy of Becky from Glue and Glitter
11. Polenta Pizza with Kale Pesto
12. Sweet Potato and Kale Enchiladas
14. Vegan Chicken Caesar Salad with Kale
That red curry noodle stew sounds great for a rainy day! Nice collection of recipes for folks new to kale… like me :)
Lentil wrap with greens = Dinner tomorrow!
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