Kale Chips

Awhile ago, when I was subscribing to a bunch of baby food websites, I saw a recipe for Kale Chips.  I didn't know what kale was, but it looked like some sort of lettuce, and it was coated in a dressing & baked into chips.  This looked interesting, but James was just barely starting to transition to finger foods & I had no idea where to get kale, so I didn't do much about it.

Fast forward a couple months, and I get kale in the produce basket!  When I had some time I went back & looked up the recipe for Kale Chips.  I was very excited to try this out!  The original recipe I had seen called for only coating the kale in olive oil or spraying with canola cooking spray, but I wasn't sure that would have enough flavor.  So I found another recipe that called for paprika, ginger, and chili powder, & thought that would be good.

• 8 leaves kale
• 1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
• (1/2 teaspoon ground ginger)
• 1/4 teaspoon paprika
• (Pinch chili powder)
• (Kosher salt)

1. Preheat the oven to 250° F. Remove the stems and woody ribbing from the tender leaves. Tear the kale into bite-size pieces. Wash and dry.
2. In a large bowl, whisk together the olive oil, ginger, paprika, and chili powder.  Stir in the kale leaves and toss with your hands, coating each leaf, front and back. Lay the kale out on a parchment paper–covered cookie sheet, and sprinkle with the salt. Wash your hands so you don’t rub chili powder into your eyes. Just sayin’.
3. Bake in the oven until they are flat and crisp, about 15–20 minute.

Original recipe: http://mealmakeovermoms.com/kitchen/2010/05/12/breakfast-for-dinner-blogger-event-recipe-for-kale-chips-podcast-103/ (it's the second topic so scroll down to the bottom half of the page).

Notes:
~ I'm not sure why it says to mix the olive oil & spices in a large bowl.  1 1/2 tablespoons of olive oil is not going to fill a bowl!
~ Of course, the original recipe calls for 1 pound of kale leaves, and I only had 8 little leaves, so maybe that's why...
~ I sadly discovered when I went into my cupboard that I didn't have any ginger, and I swear I have chili powder but I couldn't find it.  So the olive oil & paprika got mixed together and that was that.  I also realized as I'm writing this that I forgot to put any salt on.  Whoops.
~ I used 1 tablespoon of olive oil and it wasn't enough for the 8 little leaves I had, I ended up adding more oil & paprika, but I didn't measure how much.

The kale chips came out ok.  I didn't remove enough of the "woody ribbing" from the center of the leaves, it alllllll has to go!  The flavor was just ok, but I could taste the kale strongly and it was a little odd.  So I sprinkled some parmasean cheese on them and that definitely helped!  James really liked the chips at first, he kept leaning forward to get more while I was holding him, but once I put him in his high chair & gave him several pieces he didn't eat much anymore.  I'm not sure what the difference was.  Tim liked them too, he said it was obvious that it wasn't potato chips but they were good.

I do want to make these again, but first will make sure I have ginger & chili powder in my cupboard.  :-)