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Discover What Kale Can Do for You – and Some Interesting Facts

In recent years its seems kale has become all the rage among health and nutrition buffs. It’s for several reasons. Let’s have a look.

What’s Kale Good For?

• Protecting different parts of the eye from potential damage by light or oxygen due to it’s high content of lutein, a carotenoid. It’s a top lutein-containing food in the USDA’s National Nutrient Database of 5,350 foods.

• If you’re vegetarian or interested in reducing your meat consumption, you’ll be interested to learn that kale and lentils together have been found to be nutritionally very complimentary. This combination is able to provide a much wider range of beneficial nutrients and minerals because each supplies what the other lacks. For complete nutrition in a meal kale and lentils nick together especially well.

• When prepared by steaming it has properties, that recent studies have proven, help in reducing cholesterol levels. The steaming process allows the fiber component in the kale to bind more efficiently with bile acids in the digestive system. This makes it easier for the bile acids to be carried out of the body thus lowering cholesterol levels.

• There’s so many more benefits, such as helping prevent glaucoma and more – but I’ll keep this letter short. (You can learn more about what kale has to offer by checking out foodfacts.mercola.com/kale)

How To Steam Kale for Extra Benefits

Using your fingers strip the leafy portion off of the middle rib. Then use a sharp knife to cut the leafy part in 1/2” strips. The mid-rib, being tougher needs to be cut smaller, about 1/4” pieces to steam properly and be ready at the same time. Put the cut up kale into a sauce pan, add a little water, but not so much as to cover the kale, and a pinch of salt. Bring to a boil and steam with the lid on for 5 minutes.

If you’re using a red kale, bear in mind that these generally need to be steamed a little longer, closer to 8 or 9 minutes. As it steams, it will lose its redness and finish up a darker green colour when tender.

Did you Know…….

• Kale is a cole crop? This means that is in the same family as cabbages, broccoli and cauliflower.
• The term “cole” is derived from the Latin term caulis meaning stem? For kale, this is quite appropriate as the plant consists of one large stem from which sprout the edible leaves which are harvested from the bottom up.
• While kale is available year round, it is most abundant in the fall months? In fact, a good hard frost or even a snow fall tends to improve the flavour making it more popular when the cold weather arrives.
• Although, new strains are being developed, the kale we know today really has a long history. In fact, it goes back some 2000 years when it was known and cultivated in the Mediterranean region.
• There are many varieties of kale and each has its own unique nutrient profile, not to mention, taste and appearance?
• Even though there are many varieties of kale in existence, only a few are grown commercially on a large scale?
• Kale can be stored in the freezer or even dehydrated? We’ll tell you how a little later.
• Generally there are two forms of kale available for purchase: baby leaf kale and regular kale.

A Warning About Kale and Other Coles

If you have an underactive thyroid or suffer from hypothyroidism then you’ll want to be careful of how much Kale and other cole family vegetables you consume as they can exacerbate the condition.