Raw Kale Salad with Tomato & Avocado

After eating out for like five days straight, I felt like Monday was a day for a light, healthy dinner.  Before going to work, I looked in my crisper and saw the big bunch of beautiful kale that I bought on Sunday at the Farmers' Market.  Kale is such a tough green that I wasn't sure I could make it into something that wasn't sauteed greens or more delicious kale chips.  BUT I remembered that my new cookbook Clean Start has a recipe for raw kale salad and decided to give it a whirl. 

While it's certainly fine to eat a super crunchy salad, but I wanted to try out Clean Start's tip to delicious kale salad: massage.  Yes, you read that right, you have to massage the kale in order to make a tender salad.  Ah the things we do for our food.  But it totally worked!  This massage technique left me with a delightfully crispy kale salad.  Plus, the salad was still crunchy and perfect the next day for lunch!  The ingredients in this salad are completely up to you, but I would not skimp on the ginger.  It added an extra burst of freshness that was hard to beat!  This recipe is adapted from the Clean Start cookbook and will make two very large salad portions

Ingredients

One big bunch of kale
1 1/2 tbls extra virgin olive oil

1/2 avocado, peeled and chopped

1 heirloom tomato, chopped
1 tsp freshly grated ginger
2 tbls roasted sunflower seeds

Juice from half of a lemon

Juice from half a lime

Sea salt

Directions

Wash and dry the kale thoroughly.  Remove the stems from the kale leaves and rip or chop into bite-sized pieces.  Put the kale into a large bowl and add in the olive oil.  Massage the oil into the kale leaves until they are fully coated.  Add in a pinch of salt and avocado.  Massage the kale leaves again until they are fully coated.  Work the avocado in there!  Set aside to marinate for 15 minutes.

Add in your lemon/lime juice, chopped tomato, grated ginger, and sunflower seeds.  Toss and season with salt and pepper to taste.  Eat and enjoy!

........you know what would have been great in this salad?  goat cheese......... 

mmm farmers' market tomatoes made this salad extra tasty!

Adjust the salad fixings to fit your refrigerator contents, your farmers' market, and your taste.  But don't forget the kale massage and the ginger!