I love them, you love them. Potato chips are extremely tasty, they're also lacking when it comes to nutrition. But there's a way to simulate the chips, and get mega-nutrition while you're snacking thanks to kale. Suzanne Landry, who wrote the cookbook, The Passionate Vegetable came by Tonia's Kitchen to talk about her "Cheesy" Kale Chips. They're loaded with nutrition and taste, and despite the name, they don't actually have cheese. Suzanne told Tonia she uses curly leaf kale for this recipe because it takes the sauce better. As for the sauce (which is the boss!), Suzanne starts with a whole chopped red pepper, the juice of a whole lemon, and a half teaspoon of teaspoon of sea salt. Place everything in a blender and mix together. Then add a 1/4 cup of nutritional yeast and raw cashews. When the sauce is blended, it looks like Velveeta cheese! Pour the sauce into a pan and toss the stemmed kale leaves in the mix, and bake the leaves until crispy. Then you enjoy the kale krunch!
1 head curly leaf kale
1 cup raw cashews (soaked for 1 hour), drained
1 whole red pepper, seeded and diced
1 lemon, juiced
¼ cup nutritional yeast
½ tsp. sea salt
1 clove garlic minced
1/8 tsp. cayenne pepper
Optional: extra virgin olive oil.
1. Preheat oven to 200 degrees. Strip kale leaves off of stem. Whatever stem remains on top is tender enough to eat. Reserve stems for juicing or soup stock. Wash, drain and spin dry kale. Place in large bowl.
2. In a blender, add red pepper, salt and lemon juice. Blend until liquid. Add cashews and remaining ingredients. Blend on high until you get a very smooth consistency. There should be no lumps of nuts in this sauce.
3. Gently, massage the kale with both hands to soften the leaves. Now add the cream and massage the kale with the sauce until all kale is coated.
4. Place on cookie sheet on single layer. Use 2-3 cookie sheets if necessary. Place in oven and bake for 2 hours. If you have a dehydrator then place on racks and dehydrate for 12 hours.
Note: It is nutritionally better to soak the nuts but not absolutely necessary for this recipe.
