Purple Kale Salad with Cucumber, Carrot, and Lemon

Massaging kale sounds fancier than it is. You're just working a little salt and lemon into the leaves with your hands for about a minute, and it completely changes the texture from tough and bitter to soft and almost silky. This is the kind of salad that actually holds up in the fridge, so you can make it ahead and pull from it all week.

Serves: 4
Time: 15 minutes, no oven

Ingredients

• 1 large bunch purple kale, stems removed and leaves torn or sliced thin

• 2 cucumbers, sliced thin

• 2 carrots, peeled and ribboned with a vegetable peeler

• 3 green onions, sliced

• Juice of 1 lemon

• 3 tbsp olive oil

• 1 tsp honey

• Salt and pepper

• Optional: toasted sunflower seeds, crumbled feta, or a handful of fresh herbs

Directions

Put the kale in a large bowl. Drizzle about half the lemon juice and a pinch of salt over it, then get in there with your hands and massage the leaves for about a minute until they soften and darken. You'll feel them go from stiff to tender.

Add the cucumbers, carrots, and green onions. Whisk together the remaining lemon juice, olive oil, honey, salt, and pepper and pour it over everything. Toss well and taste for seasoning.

Let it sit 10 minutes before serving if you can. It gets better as it goes.

Notes

This keeps in the fridge for two days without getting soggy, which makes it worth making a bigger batch. The purple kale holds its color well, so it still looks great the next day. Add feta or sunflower seeds right before serving if you're using them.

Grown at Sand n' Straw Community Farm, Vista, CA. No pesticides, no chemicals.