Kale: Not just for hipsters and fad dieters

I'm meeting you half way with this one, hipsters. Not only am I about to extol the virtues of kale, I'm going to begin by telling you that I was cooking with it before it was cool.  To be fair, I didn't even know it was kale; I knew it only in its Italian form Cavolo Nero, which is the dark green, flat-leaved variety.  Until a couple of years ago, it was virtually impossible to find here, and I was only introduced to it via my travels and my collection of cookbooks. Stephanie Alexander and Maggie Beer write about it in their 1999 Tuscan Cookbook (referring to it as "unavailable in Australia"), and Jamie Oliver uses it in a recipe for Ribollita in Jamie's Italy. Whenever some would appear miraculously in a green grocer's, I would get very excited and rush home, bunch in hand to cook up a batch of soup. I suppose I should extend my grudging thanks to the kale bandwagon that has ensured its regular availability on my supermarket shelves.

But, at the risk of being culinarily unfashionable, I need to make one thing absolutely clear: kale is a form of cabbage and should be treated as such. That is, it is a delight in soups, sauteed, and braised, but is fairly unappealing in its other incarnations. I'm going to come right out and say it: raw kale in salad is totally unpalatable and tastes revolting (funnily enough, like eating raw cabbage) and should not be 'a thing'. And, despite the variety of cultivars on the market, I still only use Cavolo Nero, or, as it's sometimes more prosaically marketed, 'Tuscan Kale' or 'Tuscan Cabbage', as it has the tenderest leaves when cooked.

Below are my three favourite kale recipes, and now that the cold weather has well and truly set in, these belly-warming dishes make the most of this seasonal ingredient.

Chicken and Vegetable Zuppa

When I make this soup (stew really; it's quite hearty), and I do so regularly, I can't help but think that this is exactly the kind of good, healthy food that we are supposed to eat.  And although we are infinitely more fortunate in the kind of food available to us than our forebears were, I feel a kind of latent peasant satisfaction making it, especially when I adapt this recipe to use up leftovers or make use of a cheap seasonably available ingredient. I am particularly fond of stretching out any leftover soup by adding a little more chicken stock, then bulking it out with torn up stale bread or leftover pasta. I even keep the vegetable peel and ends in a plastic bag (see picture), and when I have a bagful, I use them with leftover bones or meat pieces to make a stock.  If anything encapsulates my approach to home cooking and healthy eating, it is this.

Serves 3- 4 (depending on the size of the thigh fillets and how much bread you serve with it)

Ingredients

5 chicken thigh fillets, excess fat trimmed, diced                    

1 onion

2 carrots

2 sticks celery

2 small zuccini 
2 small potatoes, peeled

1/2 bunch cavolo nero 

1/2 tin tomatoes (doesn't matter what kind, but I prefer San Marzano tomatoes)

1 litre salt-reduced chicken stock

1 piece of parmesan cheese rind (purely optional, but will add nice flavour)

olive oil, salt, pepper.

Method

In a large pot, brown the chicken in olive oil and season with a little salt.   Do this in batches if necessary.  Remove chicken to a plate.   

Next (or meanwhile, depending on your multitasking skills), dice the onion, carrots, celery, zucchini and potato.  Add more oil to the pot if necessary, then saute the vegetables until softened.  While you're waiting for the vegetables to cook, trim the stalks from the cavolo nero, then slice finely.

Add the tomatoes to the pot and cook for a few minutes until amalgamated with the other vegetables, then add the stock, cavolo nero, parmesan rind and the chicken.  Simmer for at least half an hour, or until the chicken is tender and falling apart. If you have used a parmesan rind, fish it out before serving and eat it yourself.  Cook's privilege.

Serve the soup topped with parmesan cheese, cracked pepper if you like, and with crusty bread.

Strozzapreti with Sausage and Braised Cavolo Nero

Strozzapreti (literally translated as 'priest stranglers') are my favourite kind of pasta - the perfect length between fusilli and macaroni - and the artisan variety keeps a pleasing al dente texture when cooked. Here, I've paired strozzapreti with Italian pork sausages (I prefer the ones with fennel), and cavolo nero braised with tomatoes. You can easily vary this dish by experimenting with the many different types of sausages available at your local butchers.  Chorizo would be magic here too.

Serves 4

Ingredients

1/2 bunch cavolo nero
6 Italian Sausages (of regular thickness. adjust quantity if using the really thick ones)
300g pasta (strozzapreti, or other kind of short pasta like fusilli or penne)
1 small onion, finely diced
1 tin tomatoes
Pinch chili flakes (optional)
Olive oil
Salt
Parmesan, grated, to serve.

Method

Bring a pot of salted water to the boil and cook the pasta until al dente.

Meanwhile, prepare the kale by removing the tough stalks and central rib, then chop finely.

Chop sausages into 1.5 - 2 cm lengths. In a deep frying pan or shallow casserole pan, fry the sausage in some olive oil until cooked, then remove to a plate.

Cook the onion slowly until soft, then add the tomatoes, chili and kale. Cover the pan with a lid or foil and let simmer, When the kale leaves are tender, add the cooked sausage and pasta to the vegetables. Season with salt.  Let simmer for 5 minutes or so, so that the flavours amalgamate, then serve.

Ribollita

Ribollita is essentially a leftovers dish whereby soup, traditionally minestrone, is stretched further by adding torn up stale bread then 'reboiled'.  Giving recipe quantities for the bread component is a bit tricky - a lot depends on the bread you use, and how thick you want your ribollita.   So, I've given the recipe for the soup, then you can gradually add chunks of bread until you have achieved the desired consistency. The bread you use should be chewy, with a dense texture so that it holds up to cooking without disintegrating into a slimy mess.

Serves 4

Ingredients

1 L salt reduced chicken stock
1 small bunch cavolo nero, stalks and rib removed, finely sliced.
1 small onion, diced
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
2 carrots, diced
2 sticks celery, diced
1 tin tomatoes
1 tin cannellini beans
Stale bread, torn into chunks
Olive oil
Salt and pepper
Parmesan cheese (plus a piece of rind, if you have it)

Method

In a casserole pan or large saucepan, soften the onion in olive oil, then add the garlic, carrot and celery. When the vegetables have softened, add the tomatoes and cook until broken down.  Add the stock, parmesan rind (if using), and cavolo nero.  Let the soup simmer for about half an hour, then taste for seasoning, adding salt and pepper as needed.

Fish out the parmesan rind and add the chunks of bread, a handful at a time. If you accidentally add too much bread, you can easily thin the soup back out by adding more stock or a little water.

Serve with a swirl of olive oil and grated parmesan.