Kale Salad

I really love this salad, although looking at the recipe it doesn't seem quite right:  Mayonnaise dressing?
Somehow it's perfect, anyway.  I have a little left over for lunch and I'm trying to figure out how to get it all for myself and not share with Dad.  It's from the Arizona Daily Star.  I'm putting a link to the whole article here, but it may not work for non-subscribers.

I substituted cotija cheese for the manchego.  We always have cotija around and it's really useful for a garnish.  It's sharp, salty, and crumbly, but not too assertive.

Also, I massaged the kale pieces with 1 teaspoon salt first to break up some of the tough fibers.  I rinsed it and dried it before proceeding with the recipe.

Kale Salad

Serves: 6

For the dressing:

• 2 tablespoons cider vinegar
• 2 tablespoons lemon juice
• 1/2 cup mayonnaise
• 2 tablespoons sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt

For the salad:

• 1 large bunch (about 1 pound) Tuscan kale, stems torn or cut out, leaves torn into small pieces
• 1/3 cup dried apricots, julienned
• 1/3 cup pumpkin seeds
• 2 ounces manchego cheese, grated
• 1 Pink Lady apple, cored and cut into thin half moons
• Ground black pepper

To make the dressing, in a large bowl whisk together the vinegar, lemon juice, mayonnaise, sugar and salt. Add the kale and toss to coat well, then set aside for 10 minutes. After 10 minutes, toss again to coat well.

Sprinkle the apricots, pumpkin seeds and cheese over the dressed kale. Toss again to evenly distribute. Season with pepper and additional salt, if needed. Fan thin slices of apple over the top of the salad and serve.

Raw Kale Salad

I've made this several times over the past few months. It's inspired by the raw kale side dish I always order when I go to Good Life Cafe, a vegan raw food place in West Columbia.

I've used various kinds of kale, and all worked well. I really like the flavor of lacinato kale an awful lot, though.

Many raw kale salad recipes use the massage method, and it really seems to work -- it loosens up the intense fibrousness of the leaves and helps them absorb dressing without cooking.

With uncooked greens, I find a little serving goes a long way. One bunch of kale can serve many people over several meals.


Wash:

1 bunch kale

Remove ribs and cut into thin (half- or quarter-inch) strips across the grain. Place in bowl or colander, sprinkle with 1 teaspoon salt, and massage with both hands for a minute or two, squeezing and kneading to make the kale wilt and relax.

In another bowl, mix:

1 clove garlic, minced
1-2 tablespoons tahini
juice of 1 lemon
pinch salt

Add as needed to make a thin dressing:

olive oil
warm water
honey, if the lemon juice is bitter

Toss with kale.

Roasted Kale

Holy cow, have you made roasted kale yet? I read about it almost a year ago but just now got around to making it. It's stunning. We ate it two nights in a row.

Basically you strip some kale leaves off the stalks, wash and dry them, toss them with olive oil, and roast them at 375 degrees for about 5 minutes per side. Err on the low side -- the leaves get overly brown very easily. A little chewiness is okay, as it will be mixed in with brownish crispy patches. And while the recipes I read said to toss the kale with salt, and I am a salt fanatic, I actually left it out altogether and liked it better. But try it both ways.

Kale, Potato, and White Bean Soup II: An Actual Recipe

I've made this soup several times since I first posted about it, so I thought I'd post the recipe. It's easy, quick for a hearty soup, and healthy (especially if, like me, you think a little bit of pork fat will probably be found someday to have secret health benefits).

Today a friend brought me three bunches of collards from her father's winter garden. The first bunch I cooked quite plainly in olive oil and seasoned with salt, dried red pepper, and vinegar, but perhaps another bunch will make its way into this soup.

In a Dutch oven, cook 4 strips of meaty bacon cut into smaller squares with scissors. Remove and drain on paper towels. Pour off all but 1 tablespoon of bacon fat.

Add 1 tablespoon olive oil. Saute 1 or 2 chopped onions until translucent.

Add 1/2 cup white wine or 1/4 cup vermouth, scraping up any browned onion and bacon bits.

Add and bring to simmer:
-2 potatoes, cubed
-1 large can cannellini beans, with goo
-a few big sprigs fresh thyme
-2 bay leaves
-chicken stock to cover (stock from a smoked turkey is also perfect)
-salt and pepper

When soup is simmering, add bit by bit, stirring as it cooks down:
-1 medium bunch kale, collards, or other greens, sliced

Simmer for 30 to 45 minutes, until soup is thick and whitened. Stir in 1 teaspoon lemon zest. Add bacon back in and serve.

Kale, Mushrooms, and Bacon over Polenta Taragna

Last night I made this, which is easily one of the best things I've eaten this year -- much more than the sum of its parts. The lemon zest pulls the dish together in surprising ways.

Some minor modifications: I used much less thyme, because our thyme plant is dry and stunted. I used two cloves of garlic, not one. I poured off all but one tablespoon of the bacon grease before adding the olive oil. And I used polenta taragna, which is a combination of ground buckwheat and corn, instead of regular polenta. I finished the polenta with a small bit of half and half -- cheese seemed too rich.

Best of all, this dinner helped me get over the disaster earlier this week in which I roasted some buttercup squash and made a beautiful soup, only to find that it tasted like feet. It was irremediable. The squash had some sort of moldy rot, invisible to the eye, that had completely saturated the soup with strong funk. We ate grilled cheese sandwiches for dinner.

Kale has redeemed me. I love greens with all my heart.

Burger and Fries

We would love to have fresh fish three times a week, but the reality is that it's expensive and inconvenient to achieve that goal. So we sometimes fall back on frozen fish--some are better than others. I don't like frozen salmon very well, or cod, and frozen snapper is loathesome. But orange roughy, tuna (especially albacore), and halibut seem to freeze more successfully.

Last night with my thawed ahi steak I made some delicious tuna burgers. I found the recipe in American Food Writing: An Anthology with Classic Recipes, edited by Molly O'Neill.

Tuna Burgers

1 pound raw tuna

2 teaspoons minced garlic

3 tablespoons Dijon mustard

1/2 teaspoon cayenne

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon black pepper

Chop the tuna finely with a chef's knife, or grind, but don't put in food processor. Mix above ingredients, form four patties.

Saute 3 or 4 minutes per side in:

Olive oil

I skipped the recommended teriyaki glaze and served it with the more ketchup-like Thai sweet chile sauce, roasted new potatoes, and Kale with Carmelized Onions and Balsamic Vinegar. It was a light and different dinner.

Jack Bishop's kale recipe specified blanching the chopped kale for 8 minutes before stirring it into the carmelized onions. I worried about all the vitamins going down the drain, but the kale was was tender and delicious.