A kale call

Feeling a non-specific malaise, possibly due to looming predictions of rain and real fall weather, I decided I needed a nutritional boost and chose to get it from kale. This peasant green is at the forefront in many blogs and foodie magazines recently, but I happen to have it in my garden this year. It emerged unbidden as a volunteer, not in great profusion but doing well enough that in spite of a couple of cuttings its growth has continued. In years past I swore by Siberian kale, a non-curly type from Territorial Seeds that returned several years as a volunteer. This returning variety is curly. We haven't yet had the frosts that encourage the nutty notes that emerge or witnessed its renaissance in early spring when it rebounds with restorative fervor. An admission of neglect rather than aspirations of foodiness caused me to decide it was time for a little pruning. Using the scissors, I made a swath in the teeming undergrowth now known as my garden patch. It yielded two large stems of kale with all their leaves (more remain for another day), plus a few stray rainbow chard and beet greens, two baby zucchini, (one yellow, one green), and some herbs. Two large sprigs each of basil and lemon thyme, plus a little marjoram and some chives were brought in the house with the mess of greens. I chiffonaded the kale with scissors, putting the pile into my enamel dutch oven and adding about 3/4 of a cup of low-fat, low salt chicken broth (the pan was half full until until the kale diminished in the heat). I chopped up about 1/4 pound of low-fat ham rescued from the freezer and added the chopped summer squash and herbs, covering the dutch oven tightly after adding 1 tsp. dried garlic bits and about the same amount of dried onion, as well as a dash of Worchestershire sauce and 1/4 cup of dry white wine. Letting it simmer, I put three cups of water in a heavy saucepan with a 1/2 tsp. of salt and brought it to a boil, adding a half pound of whole grain penne. When it was still al dente (about 6 minutes in), I drained it, leaving a spoonful or two of water. I added most of the cooked kale mixture to the dutch oven, greatly shriveled, plus a sprinkle of smoked paprika, 1/4 pound of low-fat cream cheese and a small chunk (one or two ounces) of colby jack, which I stirred into the penne on the burner after the heat was off, adding at the last second a bit of grated parmesan. After a minute of melding on the plate, it was pretty awesome. I gave it about 45 seconds in the microwave when a third of the way into my lunch I was distracted by a phone call. That only seemed to improve it. I don't know yet about the effects of the vitamin boost, but it was what I needed.