Kale (Chips, Salad and Why should I eat it)

If someone asked you to eat kale 10 years ago, many of you would have said, "what is that".  Lately kale is becoming much more mainstream in people knowing what it is, but you still don't see it on restaurant menus.  So why eat kale, what are some good ways to get it in out bodies and how do I make this green vegetable tasty.

Kale is:

low in calories

high in fiber

high in iron - compared to beef it has more or the same

great for building blood

high in vitamin K - which is necessary for the vitamin D you take in to be absorbed

Kale is a superfood, its filled with anti -inflammatory constituents and will infuse your body with minerals and nutrients.  Be careful with the quantity you eat if you are hypothyroid.  Eating small amounts are great, but don't eat kale constantly, or juice a ton of it daily or you may find your thyroid will talk back to you very loudly.

When you eat your greens, especially leafy greens always keep this in mind you want to always add a fat and an acid, so olive oil, coconut oil, avocado, grass fed butter and an acid, lemon, lime, apple cider vinegar, tomato.  By adding both of these you will make sure that your body will take up the calcium and other nutrients you are eating instead of you eating them and not getting the nutrition out of them.

I love just removing the midrib, chopping up my kale and sauteing it in some olive oil or grass fed butter and a little salt with a splash of lemon juice or apple cider vinegar.  Following are 2 of my favorite recipes:

Kale Salad

Ingredients:

bunch of kale

olive oil

lemon

raw honey

sunflower seeds

pumpkin seeds

dried cranberries

strip the kale off the midrib and break into bite size pieces

make your salad dressing: equal parts of olive oil, freshly squeezed lemon juice, raw honey ( I use less than 1/3) and a pinch of cayenne pepper

pour the salad dressing over the kale and massage the kale for a minute or so, you want to break down the fibers as what is happening is the lemon juice is "cooking" the fibers.  

When it seems broken down enough take a handful of your seeds and dried fruit and stir

Enjoy - this is one salad where leftovers are terrific because you are wilting it before you begin.

Cheesy Kale Chips

Blend the following ingredients:

2 c cashews

½ red bell pepper

6 tbsp nutritional yeast

Juice of 1 lemon

1/4 tsp. salt

1 ½ cup water

You can blend them in a vitamix, a nutribullet or try a food processor or regular blender, you want to make sure the nuts are totally blended.  If you find that your blender hasn't blended totally, let it sit for a little bit and then blend again, the water will soak into the nuts, in the future, soak the nuts in the water before blending..

Now take your 2 bunches kale and your batch of cashew cheese sauce

Pour cashew cheese sauce on kale pieces and massage until they seem to have broken down. Set on dehydrator sheets. Dehydrate for approx 6 hours at 115 until crispy. Enjoy!     If you want to put them in an oven because you don't have a dehydrator put it on a low heat and just keep watching them.  I did this to try it out for you and left  them too long and and they burned so be careful

Enjoy them, they keep me satisfied when i want a snack because they have good crunch a little salt, lots of minerals and taste delicious