We picked up our first order of the Spring from the Nebraska Food Cooperative last Thursday. Yesterday I finally got around to using some of our purchases. Using The Flavor Bible I looked up kale. I decided to use the following suggested ingredients in the dish: potatoes, onion, red pepper flakes, garlic, pork, chicken stock. The dish turned out great as far as taste, but it’s not the most appetizing thing to look at. The potatoes were a little overdone and the bacon wasn’t crisp. But I’ve got some ideas on how to rectify that, which I’ll list at the end of this post.
First I’d like to introduce the local fair I used to create this dish.
The Cottage Bacon was purchased from Harvest Valley Foods. Cottage bacon is made from the shoulder of the pig, not from the sides or belly like most bacon. As a result the cottage bacon is more lean. The bacon from Harvest Valley Foods had a nice smoky flavor and not too salty.
The potatoes we didn’t order, they were free! Nebraska Specialty Produce was at Jane’s Benson Health Market, our pickup place for NFC, giving them away. Apparently they had a few potatoes left over from last year. They had three varieties: Bintje, Purple Majesty and Laratte Fingerling. We chose to go with the Purple Majesty, instead of a mixed bag. We really liked the potatoes they gave us, and we’ll purchase some more when they have a new crop this year. Both Bob and Tanner Lemon seemed like real nice people. They don’t have a website at the moment, but they can be reached at rlemon [at] curtis-ne [dot] com.
The kale was purchased from Community Crops. The kale is on the left in the picture and cutting celery on the right. I made pesto out of the cutting celery, which I’ll post about at a later date. The kale was flavorful, clean, and the stems small enough to eat. The only thing I didn’t like about the kale was the size of the bunch, 3-3/4 oz. I just have to remember to purchase more than one bunch next time.
Ingredients:
- 1 pound of potatoes, cubed
- 6-8 oz of kale, roughly chopped
- 1/2 onion, diced
- 4 oz cottage bacon, diced
- 2 cloves garlic, minced
- 1/8 teaspoon red pepper flakes
- 1 tablespoon oil
- 1/2 cup chicken stock
- Salt and Pepper
Directions:
Precook potatoes until they are almost soft all the way through, drain, and set aside. Add the bacon to a large frying pan, with the oil, over medium low heat. Slowly cook the bacon to release the fat. Once the fat has rendered as much as it’s going to, turn up the heat and add the onion and red pepper flakes. Saute the onion until it’s translucent, then add the garlic. Stir the garlic until it releases it’s aroma and add the chicken stock. Mix in the potatoes and kale, reduce the heat and cover. Cook until kale is tender. Add salt and pepper to taste, and serve.
As I mentioned before I wasn’t completely happy with the way this dish turned out. Next time I try this I’m going to braise the kale with the chicken stock in a separate pan. Then at the end, briefly toss the potatoes in the bacon, garlic, onion, oil mixture; add the soft kale and warm through. That way hopefully the bacon will be crispy and the potatoes won’t be too soft.
By Kenton
Finding a good dessert for just the two of us can be a challenge. Most make just too much for two people. And what about single people. When I was single, I had no business baking a whole cake and eating it by myself. Which is one of the reasons I love crisps.
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