kale salad!

I never thought I would come around to this! But I did! I was resistant to putting sweetened stuff in it but the driedcranberries make it especially fun.

1 bunch kale, washed, stems removed, cut into ribbons
dressing: 1 lemon worth of juice, neutral oil like canola, salt, pepper, garlic powder, *toasted sesame oil*
pine nuts
grape tomatoes, sliced in half
dried sweetened cranberries
avocado

grated Parmesan (add just before eating)

Mix well, let it sit with the dressing on it for half an hour at least to sort of "cook" the kale, i.e. break it down a bit with the acid from the lemon. Don't put too much salt in the dressing. Also be sparing with the canola oil.

cranberry muffins

Modified from http://www.meatlessmonday.com/fresh-cranberry-muffins/

• 1 cup white flour
• 1 cup white whole wheat flour
• 1/3 cup brown sugar (dark)
• a bit less than 1/3 cup white sugar
  
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• cinnamon to taste
  
• 1 cup fresh cranberries, chopped
• 2/3 cup milk
• 1/4 cup (unsalted) butter or stick margarine, melted
• 1 teaspoon orange rind, grated
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 large egg, lightly beaten
• cooking spray

Preheat oven to 400. Mix flours, sugars, salt, and cinnamon. Mix milk, melted butter, orange rind, vanilla, and egg. Add chopped cranberries to dry ingredients, stir. Grease muffin tin (12-cup). Stir wet ingredients into dry until just combined. Spoon into muffin tins, bake for 18 minutes or until muffins spring back lightly when touched in the center. Remove immediately and cool on wire racks.

VERDICT: The texture was OK, but too tart. They also have a strange almost fake-sugar taste (not that I've really consumed enough fake sugar to know.) Maybe I needed to cut the cranberries into smaller pieces, or use the full 1/3 cup of sugar. Or stir some sugar into the cranberry mixture first. Dunno. Also, let the melted butter cool before stirring it into the milk mixture. I was impatient and mine re-solidified when it hit cold milk.

kale-cranberry barley salad

This is a copy of something I've seen (but not eaten) in the Whole Foods salad bar. I went for a higher ratio of kale to barley, and I made sure not to overcook my kale (theirs looks pale sometimes.)

1-1.5 c pearled barley
1 bunch kale (lacinato)
1-2 onions
balsamic vinegar
4 oz dried cranberries
olive oil
lemon
salt
pepper


Cook some pearled barley: I used between 1 and 1.5 cups of dry barley. Cook in 3x as much water: boil water in pot, add in barley, return to boil, cover and turn down to simmer. Official instructions I've read said 45 minutes' cooking time, but I let it go only about 30ish, and then turned off the flame and let it absorb some more water. There was still water left in the pot, but I figure that helped keep the grains separate and non-mushy.

Saute/almost-sort-of begin to caramelize an onion (I used 1 medium, I'd use two if I'd had more) that's been sliced thin - I did thing onion rings and then sliced into 2-3 cm long pieces. Remove onion to bowl.

Add slight bit oil in pot, add 1 bunch lacinato/dinosaur kale which has been washed, stems removed, and chopped into bite-sized pieces. Cook lightly, possibly add a bit of water and cover it. Really just go slightly beyond wilting it.

Add to that bowl with the sauteed onions: about 2 TBS balsamic vinegar (or more), 1 TBS olive oil, some salt, some pepper, some lemon juice (1/4 of a lemon?) Now add in kale, warm barley, and about 4 oz of dried sweetened cranberries. Stir, adjust spices. Consider adding a little white sugar if it needs it. Good cold.