Kale Thoran - Cooking from my Garden

Every year I look forward to May – planting season in Colorado.  The weather starts warming up, kids start wearing shorts and t-shirts (even thought temperatures are sometimes in the 40s to 50s), nights are no longer below freezing, and plants and trees begin to come back to life.

A couple of times in the past, I have been so excited about having several warm weather days in a row, and planted my vegetable garden by the first week in May.  Just when the tomato plants begin to look healthy and my peppers show signs of flowering, a freak snowstorm (Colorado is famous for these) hits and all my plants die!  I have since learned my lesson and no matter how tempting it is to get started, I wait till Memorial Day weekend to start my vegetable patch.

This year, along with my regular plants like tomatoes, peppers, chilies, zucchini, squash, and eggplant, I also planted different varieties of kale.  We have had such a moist spring that my kale plants have thrived.

I have only had kale in salads and wanted to try something different.  So I decided to make a dry curry with kale. It is really simple to make and tastes great.  You can serve it with rotis or with rice.

Here is what you need:

• ½ cup split moong dal, soaked in water for about ½ hour and drained
• 2 – 3 tsp. oil
• ½ tsp. mustard seeds
• ½ tsp. split urad dal
• 2 red chilies
• few curry leaves
• 2 cups packed, assorted kale leaves, washed and chopped
• ¼ tsp. turmeric powder
• salt to taste

Here is how I made it:

1. Heat oil in a kadai/pan.  Add mustard seeds.  When they sputter, add the urad dal and red chilies.
2. When the red chilies change color, add the soaked moong dal and chopped kale.  Mix well.
3. Add turmeric powder and salt.  Sprinkle a little bit of water (maybe ½ cup) cover and cook for about 7 –  8 minutes.
4. Check to make sure that the kale and moong dal are cooked well. Kale takes a little longer than spinach to cook.  So you make have to cook this for about 10 minutes or so, depending on how tender the leaves are.
5. Turn off the heat.  You can add shredded coconut at this point if you like.  I did not.

Serve with rotis or rice.