I Love My Wife's Kale Salad!

Until a couple years ago, I was indifferent to kale. I am pretty sure that I thought I understood it was a vegetable, but I had no idea it was actually a green leafy vegetable. I started reading and researching books on the benefits of basing your diet on natural sources of food such as vegetables and fruits while avoiding processed foods and meat. During this time there were only a few well-known books on the benefits of a natural diet vs. the dozens of books on this topic today. I noticed that a common thread in these books was the many glaring health benefits of kale. Pound for pound kale has more protein than does steak. Kale is a tremendous source of fiber and has high levels of Vitamins K, A, C, B6 and many other healthy nutrients. Kale is a natural antioxidant and multiple studies have shown a reduced rate of cancers and heart disease in people whose diets consisted of large amounts of green leafy vegetables i.e. kale.  

Once I became properly educated on the benefits of kale, I discussed this great new superfood with my wife, and we set out to shop for kale and start our new healthy diet. Our first foray into this process didn’t quite work out as planned. We bought a head of kale and tried to eat it with basic salad dressing. It was sour as sour could be. The aftertaste was worse than having orange juice immediately after brushing your teeth. It was horrible! So we looked up a few recipes online and decided to bake some kale chips. They actually turned out OK. The kale chips were edible, but they tasted like something you’d only eat in an attempt to be healthy. So we started to make different kale salads based on the recipes we found online. The results were adequate at best. I didn’t exactly look forward to kale salad night after a long day at work.

A trip to Aspen, Colorado two years ago changed my relationship with kale forever! Aspen is the mecca of healthy eateries in the Rockies. There are many vegetarian restaurants and vegetarian options on every menu – even at a famous barbecue restaurant in town. Not only does the town have a great variety of healthy foods, it has the most delicious healthy menu options I have seen. One day we ordered a kale salad at a basic moderately priced burger joint at the base of the mountain, and this salad was a life changing taste explosion. The salad wasn’t bitter. It filled my criteria for a satisfying meal – substantial, filling, attractive looking with fluffy greens, pine nuts, cheese and it was ridiculously healthy. We went back to the restaurant several times during our stay and compared the salad to other really good kale salads in a variety of low to high priced establishments. My wife took notes and she she recreated the salad when we got home. She has prepared this salad for us almost every week since that trip, and we have delighted multiple people with its lure. In all honesty every time she prepares it and brings it to a friend’s house it becomes the hit of the night.

This kale salad has changed our diet and our home menu. I credit it with helping us to become healthier over the last two years and in part inspiring me to create this blog to motivate others to adopt a healthy lifestyle. Once I discovered that healthy foods can actually taste just as good if not better than the unhealthy stuff we sometimes eat, I became interested in finding more healthy foods that taste great.

Since you are smart enough to read my blog and read this far down, I am going to share this salad recipe with you. I know that once you try it you will be hooked. Add chicken or fish if you must though it’s not required or even necessary, and please let me know what you think. By the way I use kale in my smoothies, and it blends in so well with the other ingredients. Check out some of my old blog entries about smoothies for some of these great tasting recipes:http://docmatthew.com/2013/11/13/dont-forget-about-healthy-smoothies/

Here is the recipe!

My Wife’s Awesome Kale Salad:

Note: She does not use the exact measurements. She uses the ingredients below and tastes it as she prepares it.

Kale – 5 cups

Toasted Pine Nuts ¼ – ½  cup

Currants – ½ cup

Parmesan Cheese (add some, toss and add more)

Orange Segments (optional) – ½ orange

Olive Oil (toss until all kale is coated)

Best if let sit for an hour or more in the olive oil before serving

Stay Healthy!….DocMatthew

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