Pampered Kale

I’ve been so stuck on baking lately. In this foggy, chilly weather the only thing that sounds appealing is snuggling up with cookies and muffins and a good DVD. But I gotta get out of this rut… not that it’s such a terribly bad thing really. But I have baked more cookies and looked up more dessert recipes than this nutritionist would care to admit (David Lebovitz, you know you’ve succeeded when the nutrition girl wants nothing but the variations of your ice cream sandwiches for a week straight). So before my carbohydrate count gets higher than my credit score (which really isn’t saying much anyway). I’ll opt to make an effort toward something a bit more, shall we say, not birthday-treat-like.

I’m still having my fun with vegetables, despite the winter weather. Even cold salads can still be so appealing when paired with a hot stew or toasted sandwich. I was reminded of this last week when I was fortunate enough to take another mini cooking class from one of my favorite Bastyr instructors. We learned three different salads, all cold, that were appealing for any season. The class reminded me yet again that a poor student shouldn’t be afraid of loading up her shopping card with 15 different colorful vegetables to make a single salad. It’s worth it. So thank you, Jennifer, for re-inspiring me in the middle of January.

If you want an energy-boosting addition to your lunch, try this massaged kale salad (yes, us nutritionists pamper our vegetables with spa-like treatments on occasion). Kale is a powerhouse of nutrition – lots of vitamin A, K, tons of fiber, and the texture has such a satisfying chew. You can buy kale as either curly, or the lacinato (a.k.a ‘dinosaur’) variety. Both are great, and both would work well in this salad. If you’re the type who goes to the market and skips the entire leafy green section because you have trouble identifying the collards from the chard – then don’t worry, this salad works well with just about any bunch of winter leafies that you mistakenly buy. Well, except for mustard greens that is (back away… far, far away.)

I’m putting away my measuring cups and wooden spoons for now, so I can begin to focus on more color and creative dressings, stir-frys and food that involves more than my go-to staples and the tried-and-true. Time to open up my thinking and let in unfamiliar ingredients and combinations. This is quite possibly my one and only resolution this year. Crack open that neglected cookbook! Play with stuff you can barely pronounce! Try a recipe that doesn’t sound like something you’d like to make! Savor the unknown!

…just as long as I can do it with my favorite comfort foods on hold in the fridge and a warm blanket waiting for me on the couch.

Behind every adventuresome cook is a good plate of mac ‘n cheese.

Massaged Kale Salad
Makes 6 servings
Original recipe by Jennifer Adler, CN www.realizehealth.com

Jennifer claims this salad just keeps getting better with time – she loves hers best on the 10th day. I doubt mine will stick around the fridge that long. Feel free to experiment with the ingredients, try different crumbly cheeses and nuts according to what you have on hand.

1 bunch kale, de-stemmed, cut into bite-sized pieces
1 teaspoon sea salt
¼ cup olive oil
2-3 tablespoons raw apple cider vinegar
¼ cup diced red onion
1/3 cup currants
¾ cup diced apple
1/3 cup sunflower seeds, toasted
1/3 cup gorgonzola cheese, crumbled

Put kale in a large mixing bowl. Add salt, massage salt into kale for 2 minutes. Gently stir in remaining ingredients except for cheese. Taste and adjust for salt and vinegar. When at desired flavor gently stir in cheese.

Leftovers

The last piece of apple pie is still in the fridge, but that's all that's left of our Thanksgiving meal. 

Thought I'd share it with you...

**The recipe I used is the classic apple pie recipe that everyone and their grandmother uses from the Joy of Cooking... but using part honey instead of all sugar, with a few more spices thrown in for good measure. The crust is a fantastic all-butter affair stolen from the Smitten Kitchen. Enjoy.

A Weekend of Apples

These perilous days of September.  The sky too achingly blue, too clear, like blue bottle glass, the low angle of the sunlight giving warning.  This day may be the last, but tomorrow could be too.  We don’t know what will steal it away so quickly, or when or where we’ll feel it, but we know it’s coming.  The perilous days, more exciting to wake up to because we know they are so fragile.  Is this our last day of perfection?  Will it all be gone tomorrow?  It’s now or never.  We feverishly squeeze in our bike rides, our weekend trips, our plans to have friends over for dinner on the porch.  Between two jobs, the lazy days of summer I’ve worked all away– so I suppose these will be my lively days of September. 

The apples are here.  The blackberries are giving a mighty push to squeeze out the last of their fruit, and the plums have come and gone.  It seems just yesterday that Mark and I, laughing and jumping like kids, reached and climbed up into the trees to grab Rainier cherries.  But cherries are early summer, befitting for a plush bright fruit, sweet and colorful as sunshine, holding promise of the sweet and painted days to come. 

But apples, well they’re a much different story. 

I’ve been in denial about the summer being gone, protesting loudly like a frustrated toddler whenever Mark would muse on its passing.  “No, it’s NOT gone,” I’d say near tantrum.  But oh, now that the apples have come, I accept with solemnity and grace, much like the solemn apple itself. 

I pick them up from the ground, scattered around the baseball fields near our house.  I pick them up, one by one, as if they are the memories of summer days, fallen from the tree of August.  They are small, some ruddy and streaked with brown sunspots and others green on one side and rosy on the other.  They are smooth and warm from the sunshine.  They fit like worry stones in the palm of my hand.  I fill my sack, and then pluck the last of the blackberries from the bordering bushes, scratching my arms and staining my thumb and forefinger a magenta juice.  I work slowly, peacefully, with an inward-turning energy that appears only with the approach of Fall.

This will be the weekend of apples.  

Before our weekend trip, I take the apples and salvage what I can from their bruised and worm-eaten flesh.  They are sweet and tart.  I put them in a cast iron skillet skin-on along with the blackberries, add honey, butter and cook them into a rustic compote that we have for dessert over vanilla ice cream.  We then toss a few Granny Smiths, a Pink Lady and a Gala into our bag for the trip.  These will go with us, hiker-friendly food for September.

The next morning we drive north excited to camp and excited to trek for miles in nothing but wilderness.  The sun is shining.  Before long we hit the Skagit Valley, known for its abundance of just about everything – blueberries, strawberries, and yes, apples.  It was about lunchtime when I spotted the road sign ‘Tourist Activities’ which I typically ignore… but after those words was written ‘Winery.’  Sold.  Even if the wine wasn’t great, there would be a place to picnic and have sandwiches.  At the end of a long gravel drive, there was not only a winery, but another building with simple signage: Apples. 

Along with the sips of blackberry and apple wine, the pinot noir and the sangiovese, we bought apples - sour Gravensteins so tart they made my cheeks hurt.  But what we really wanted (and were so tempted to make off with when the owner’s back was turned) were these incredible Japanese dessert apples, called Akane.  They were growing on a single tree, right outside the door to the apple shed.  “That is the most photographed tree on the property” said the owner.  Well, if we couldn’t have a taste, we could have a picture, which surely is worth a thousand Mmmmm’s. 

So we will take a bite with our eyes, my friends, which we forget can be just as beautiful and rich as the taste experience itself.  

The apples disappeared from our backpacks, one by one, all weekend long.  They saw glaciers, mountain tops and waterfalls.  The trip was exhausting as we hiked for miles, all under those incredibly blue skies while suspending belief that these days would soon be gone. 

Hold fast with me, take a bite and savor a bit of September.