Fail Chips

Kale is one of the best foods, filled with nutrients so I keep hearing. I do love my mom’s Kale soup. However I believe that the love part is due to the 2 kinds of Portuguese sausage and the split pea base. Yummy! I have tried to cook kale as a side dish and once I even put it into my juicer. My juice recipe called for a head of kale. What I ended up with was about a half of a cup of kale pesto in the strainer and about 3 drops of juice. Such a waste of food.

Last week on a field trip with my son’s class to an eco-friendly farm I heard for the hundredth time that Kale is sooo good for me, but this time I got information that I could really use. The farmer told me about kale chips. My son who eats nothing heard the word “chips” asked me to make them. I had been hearing about kale chips for a while but had never made them. I am always trying to find a fruit or vegetable that the boy will eat. I ran out and bought 2 large heads of kale at Whole Foods (you know Gilda Lilly, she can’t start small).

 I bring home my lovely dark green bouquets of kale and was them, dry them, and dry them again. I put on the oven at 375 and tossed the leaves in olive oil and salt. I put the leaves on cookie sheets and put them in the oven for 2 minutes like the farmer said.

I pull out limp steamed leaves. I flip them and put them back in, and again, and again. Finally the leaves are crisp. Brown and crisp, and bitter as burnt summer grass.  Something is wrong. I look on the computer for recipes.

I find many recipes that all raved about how delicious and amazing kale chips are. “Better than potato chips” “My favorite food” “Kids love them” I lower the oven temperature to 250, take all of the leaves off of the stems, toss them in olive oil and salt, then put the leaves in a new batch for 10 minutes, flip leaves over and bake another 10 minutes. They come out dark green. Looks good! I finish baking about 20 sheetsd of chips. Dylan & Alice come in and she asks what smells so good. They each grabs a freshly baked chip and bitesit. She smiles. Then her face scrunches up. She spits the chewed up leaf into her hand and holds it out to me. “Eeew Momma? What is this? Gross!”
She throws her hand full of chewed leaves into the trash.

Dylan  eats one and starts to gag. I remind him that he was the one who asked for them. I lay on the momma guilt thick. His face turns into a smile. Well he tries to smile through the pain. I can see his eyes watering. He is my finicky eater. He is suffering for me. I am touched.

"Dylan I know that they are gross." I say with love. He releases his smile, his face explodes into panic as he jumps up and runs over to the sink to spit out the offensive leaves. Then he drinks 2 full glasses of water.

 I try a chip. Yuck. Bitter. How can something light as a feather hold do much bitterness? Maybe it’s just me? I carry some over to my neighbors who are outside watching their grandson ride around on his bike.

I wonder if I am the stereo-type annoying neighbor often portrayed in movies? I walk over smiling.

“Who wants to try a kale chip?” I say in a chipper voice. They look at me in horror, like I am offering them a syringe of black tar heroin.  They each take a huge step back. I explain the whole good for you healthy speech. The guy is brave. He takes a bite and smiles.

“Oooh, that’s disgusting.” He says shaking his head.

“I know gross right?” I say. “I thought that it was just me.” Just then the wind sweeps the rest of the chips off of the plate and they float to the ground exploding on contact with the road below.  on the black tar Good bye kale chips. Something’s just aren’t meant to be.