Kale: International Green Of Mystery

I defer to no one in my love for kale, especially the gentle lacinato variety. One of the most delicious things ever is a chopped lacinato kale salad, dressed with fresh-squeezed lemon juice, olive oil, and sea salt. It’s not only good, but good for you. Really good. From the WaPo:

Turns out there’s quite a bit of science behind this super food hype: “Kale is rich in so many different things,” says registered dietitian and nutritionist Cheryl Harris, of Harris Whole Health in Fairfax, who notes that the cruciferous veggie — which is in the Brassica family, along with broccoli, cauliflower and cabbage — is an excellent, potent source of Vitamin K, Vitamin A, Vitamin C, fiber and carotenoids, and that’s just to start. Research has also shown that kale contains 45 — count ’em, 45 — different flavonoids with a variety of antioxidant and anti-inflammatory effects.

“Any vegetable that has a very deep color the way kale does, that means there is a high concentration of nutrients, and that translates into a range of antioxidant and anti-inflammatory effects in the body,” says Deirdre Orceyre, a naturopathic physician at the Center for Integrative Medicine at the George Washington University Medical Center.

A right-thinking American expat in Paris is serving as a missionary for kale to the French:

I’m Kristen and j’adore la kale. When I moved to Paris in September 2011, I was devastated to discover that kale does not exist in France. To the point where it was all I could talk about and to the point where everyone became so aware of my [healthy] obsession with the vegetable that I would be sent every photo possible of kale in Whole Foods or the newest kale dish at a restaurant. I was jealous.

Then I realized I was not the only person in Paris (or France for that matter), that also craves the Queen of leafy-greens. So I decided that instead of complaining about the lack of kale, I would find a way to have kale in Paris.

So I launched The Kale Project to bring my favorite food to the City of Lights.

Kristen’s got the raw kale salad thing down pat. Above, from a kale menu at Paris’s Franco-American restaurant Verjus. Must try to make it by there next month.