salad

I made a salad for SHO's birthday party this weekend. I made this salad, actually, even though I was slightly skeptical. 

(Mostly I was skeptical because my primary experience with kale was the two summers circa 1990-1991 when my family lived in the muck of the AZO river valley amongst the greenhouses and the old Dutch farmer down the street gave us unending supplies of kale and sweet corn. I think we ate boerenkool and sweet corn literally every night for months. We were broke, and it was cheap.)

The good part about this salad is that I got to spend the entire weekend complaining about the need to massage kale. 

"I don't have time for that. I have to massage kale."

"I would have bought your birthday present already, but I had to massage kale."

"I need time to shower and massage kale between the hike and the party."

"I need a massage myself, and instead I am massaging kale."

See? It works brilliantly.

The fact is that I had no idea how to massage kale. Surely there is a knack to it?

But right about the time the party was to start, there I was, massaging kale. It turns out to be much easier than it sounds. Anyone can do it. I think I did it quite well, actually. I might even have a talent for massaging kale.

I'm still not sure what I think about that salad, taste-wise. Kale has such a strong taste, but it is somehow tempered by the grapefruit. A bit of grapefruit in each bite removes the bitterness of the kale.

I must like it enough, because I'm making it again right now to take to work for lunch. It is a nice alternative to the salad that I finally got sick of after four years: baby spinach, red pepper, carrots.

Do you know how tedious the same salad gets every single day? It's a relief to find a new salad base. (Don't even talk to me about iceberg or romaine lettuce. I have no time for light-colored leaves. They are a waste of chewing energy. And one of the things in mixed greens tastes like dirt, and I don't know which one it is.)