I received some Kale from a friend as payment for some computer repair, and was puzzled as to what to do with it. She gave me some suggestions about how to prepare it, but it seemed like a lot of work. I, being of good New England stock, figured that boiling the heck out of it was the solution, but she was very clear that it would be ruined, or at least its kale-ness would be severely diminished.
After careful consideration, we decided on lasagna.
I cleaned the eight or nine stalks of kale of its grass clippings (she warned me about that, too) and removed the spines, then set the leaves aside. In a small frying pan, I sauteed olive oil, garlic and mushrooms. In another pan, I put two vegetarian bouillon cubes with some water and olive oil and set them to simmer.
Next, I added the mushrooms to the bouillon to simmer. I chopped the kale into 1-inch wide strips and added it to the bouillon to simmer, stirring occasionally. Once the kale turned a rich, dark green and softened, I turned down the heat.
My oldest son, Arthur, is the lasagna king of our house, so he layered the sauteed mushrooms and kale in addition to the browned Gimme Lean vegetarian sausage, ricotta and mozzarella cheeses, spaghetti sauce, and lasagna noodles into the baking pan. He cooked it about a half hour in our imprecise oven (it's a Monarch wood-coal-electric combination stove circa 1945 featuring a thermometer in the door with useful marks like "warm" and "hot."), and let it cool for ten minutes before serving.
Delicious!
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