Kale Chip

I honestly cannot get enough of these delicious kale chips. They more than satisfy that spot that potato chips once filled, only without the greasy food hangover and the guilt. Kale is a super food among vegetables. It’s a brassica, a member of the cabbage family and is probably the closest relative to the wild cabbage. As such it has the same antioxidant power and cancer-fighting phytochemicals of the other brassicas. In fact, kale is number one in the antioxidant ratings according to The 150 Healthiest Foods on Earth. If that’s not reason enough to indulge in my kale chip addiction, I don’t know what is!

Ingredients:

1-2 bunches of kale, wash, de-stem and tear into pieces
4 tablespoons extra virgin, organic olive oil
1 tablespoon nutritional yeast
1 teaspoon organic apple cider vinegar
1 teaspoon raw organic agave syrup
1 teaspoon raw organic tahini
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
1/4 teaspoon ground turmeric
1/4 teaspoon ground cardamon
1/2 teaspoon Himalayan or Celtic sea salt
dash of powdered ginger
dash of cayenne powder to taste

Instructions:

1. Rinse the kale under running water, remove stems and tear the leaf into pieces about the size of potato chips tossing them into a large mixing bowl.
2. In a smaller bowl or cup mix all the other ingredients together, beating with a fork until there are no more lumps of tahini and everything is blended together evenly. Drizzle the mixture over the kale pieces, then massage it evenly through the kale with clean hands.
3. Grab handfuls of the coated kale pieces and scatter onto dehydrator trays. If the mixture is quite oily and dripping off the leaves, use a Teflex or Paraflexx sheet on your dehydrator tray. Otherwise you can put the kale mixture directly onto the dehydrator sheets and they will be ready to eat a bit sooner. Try to break up any large clumps of kale, but you don’t need to take the time to lay every piece out individually, just make sure they are fairly evenly scattered over 3-4 trays.
   

   Kale Chips on dehydrator tray

4. Dehydrate at 95-105F degrees overnight. If you used the Teflex or Paraflexx sheets turn the kale chips out onto the regular dehydrator sheets the next day and dehydrate for a couple more hours until crunchy. Otherwise, test to see if the chips are crunchy. If they are you can eat them immediately, or store in a sealed glass jar for later.

More nutritional facts about kale:

Kale is also loaded with calcium, iron, and vitamins A, C, and bone-building vitamin K. It contains seven times the beta-carotene of broccoli and ten times as much lutein and zeazanthin, eye-protecting carotenoids known to help protect against macular degeneration. And 2 cups of the stuff contain about 4 g of protein and 3 g of fiber.
Source: The 150 Healthiest Foods on Earth: The Surprising, Unbiased Truth About What You Should Eat and Why

I can easily snack on 2 cups of kale in the form of kale chips, getting a nice dose of healthy, uncooked oils at the same time. Although it takes extreme self-control, I try to squirrel some of the kale chips away in a glass jar for later in the evening when I start getting the munchies, or junk food cravings. Funny enough I find they also satisfy the cravings for sweets I often get late at night.

Kale Chip

Kale chips… the raw vegan alternative to potato chips. I’m addicted to them. I eat about a third of them before they even finish dehydrating. Even if I ate junk food, I’d choose kale chips over potato chips, or tortilla chips any day. Yes, they really are that good! And here’s the thing… kale is really, really good for you. Prepared this way it’s easy to eat a whole mixing bowl of kale in one sitting. My dogs adore them, I’m sure kids will too. They’re simple to make too, it’s easy to experiment, and it’s hard to go wrong with them. Here’s the most basic recipe for salted kale chips. So if you get the hankering for something salty, crunchy and oily instead of reaching for the potato chips, try some of these healthy, nutritious kale chips instead.

Ingredients:

2 bunches of kale, rinse and remove stem
3 tablespoon olive oil or hemp seed oil
1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar
Celtic or Himalyan sea salt to taste

Instructions:

1. Mix the oil, apple cider vinegar and salt in a large mixing bowl. It’s easy to add more salt later and adjust it to your taste.
2. Tear, or roughly chop the kale leaves up into bite-sized pieces. Think potato chip size, they will shrink a bit once they are dehydrated. Toss the kale pieces into the bowl with the oil and vinegar.
3. Periodically mix the kale as you are adding it by tossing the kale in the oil and ACV mixture. Get your hands in there and massage the oil into the kale. You’re aiming to have the oil and ACV evenly coating all of the kale. It’s easier to do this if you add a bit of kale, toss and massage, add some more kale, toss and massage and repeat until you have used up all the kale.
   

   Making Kale Chips: Massaging the kale

4. Place a Teflex sheet on top of a dehydrator tray and drop a handful or two of the coated kale leaves onto it. Try to spread the kale around so it’s not all clumped together, but you don’t have to be too particular about placing each individual piece because it will shrink and separate a bit as it’s dehydrating.
   

   Kale chips spread on Teflex sheet

5. Dehydrate overnight at 105-110 degrees F. It should take 10-12 hours, but times may vary due to humidity, size of the ‘chips’ and how thinly you can spread them on the sheets.
6. In the morning, turn the kale onto a regular dehydrator tray to finish it off. Dehydrate for another 2-4 hours until crispy. NOTE: I’ve now found that if I don’t spread them too thick on the sheets, that after 10-12 hours of dehydrating they will be done without having to turn them.
   

   Kale chips almost ready to eat

7. Eat fresh from the dehydrator or store in a tightly sealed glass jar to keep them crisp. I’m not sure how long they will keep because they never last for more than 2 days around me
   

   Store kale chips in a glass jar

Enjoy!

Variations:

I’ll be posting the recipes for more flavors soon, but once you get the idea from this basic recipe try experimenting with adding different spices.

• Want it a little hot and spicy? Try adding some cayenne.
• Craving a cheesy flavor? Just add some nutritional yeast or Parmesan (if you eat dairy).

You get the idea. If you come up with some tasty variations be sure to share them in the comments.

Green Smoothie

Today’s green smoothie (breakfast of Champions!) came out really creamy. I’m not sure why, but I’m sure enjoying it. I’ve got 2 superfoods packed in this one, goji berries and goldenberries (a.k.a. Incan Berries and Golden Inca Berries). Just for a change I decided to add some spice – cinnamon and ginger, it’s a subtle but nice change.

Ingredients:
4 kale leaves (stalk removed)
bunch of curly parsley (any kind will do)
4 sprigs apple mint (alternatively any other fresh mint)
2.5 cups kombucha (alternatively use filtered water)
3 frozen bananas
1 handful frozen goldenberries
1 handful dried goji berries
2 good shakes of cinnamon powder
pinch of celtic sea salt
pinch of powdered ginger

Instructions:
Put all the greens into a blender. Add kombucha up to the 2.5 cup mark on my blender jug. Blend, starting on slow and gradually turning up the speed until the liquid starts turning green (at first the liquid is still clearish, with green leafy bits in it, but I keep blending on high until the bits start liquefying).

Add the rest of the ingredients, breaking up each frozen banana into about 3 pieces. You probably don’t have to break the banana if you have a super-blender, like the Vita-mix.

The banana and goldenberries will thicken the mixture, so add more kombucha or filtered water until you smoothie is the consistency you like.

This will make several large glasses, and will keep in the fridge for the rest of the day if you want to drink it throughout the day.

Tip: The quickest way I’ve found to de-stalk the kale is to grab hold of the thick end of the stalk with one hand, wrap my thumb and index finger around the stalk near my ‘holding’ hand with my palm facing toward the leafy part and then just sliding my thumb and index finger up the stalk to pull off the leafy part.