Friday, August 17, 2012

Recipes that rock: Kale chips!

About a month or so back, my friend Diana told me about kale chips. Excited by her recent love for these crispy greens, she passed on a recipe. I finally got a chance to make them and decided that it would be fun to share my process with you!

So you wanna make kale chips? Kale is a type of cabbage that is loaded with vitamins and minerals like beta carotene, vitamin K, vitamin C and calcium. Kale is also know for being a super food in that it has cancer killing ninja abilities. It's just all around awesome.

So go grab yourself a bunch at your local market. I got mine at Fresh n' Easy and it was not only organic, but affordable too. Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Start out by thoroughly rinsing your kale. Make sure the water hits between the leaves, kale can sometimes stick together!


Next thoroughly shake all the water from your bunch and lay flat to dry. To speed the process, sandwich your kale in between two organic cotton towels.


Next, lightly oil a cookie sheet with extra virgin olive oil. Be slightly generous as the excess oil with be used to coat the kale. Chop your kale into bite size "chip" pieces. I used a pair of kitchen scissors and the kale cut nicely!


It is strongly suggested that you season your kale. I used sea salt and fresh ground peppercorn on batch number one. If you are on a restricted sodium diet, you can use Ms. Dash seasoning.


Batch 2 was modified and included: sea salt, ground pepper, onion powder, garlic powder, and a pinch of red pepper flakes for some kick!

Bake your kale chips for 20 minutes at 350 degrees. Oven temperatures and kale texture may vary so be sure to watch carefully. There was some extra oil on my chips so they were in for about 5 minutes longer.


Voila! And congratulations! If you made it this far that means you didn't set your kitchen on fire! Your lovely kale chips will be airy and crispy and slightly brown. Keep in mind that you can always adjust your oven time if you prefer them to be well done and extra crispy!

Kale is a hearty green with high nutritional value. The taste is slightly bitter with an earthy undertone. When seasoned, it tastes reminiscent of a well done potato chip. Tastes may vary but I enjoyed these little crispy gems and encourage you to try them! :)

1 comment:

Unknown said...

So glad you tried it and liked it! I continue to experiment with different types of kale and other greens. A batch doesn't last long around me! Eat more kale!