The Secret Health Benefits Of Kale (That No One Talks About) | Healthy Diet | JJ Virgin

Hey, it's JJ Virgin. New York Times best selling author of the Virgin Diet, the Virgin Diet Cookbook, and the Sugar Impact Diet. Here to answer the age old question of why the heck is kale so cool? It seems like it's everywhere. Anywhere you go, health restaurants, health food stores, it's kale, kale, kale. And you know, you can make junk food out of anything. So FYI, if you're buying those kale chips that are the chocolate chip ones, first of all, they're delicious, but second of all, they're candy. All right, but let's talk about why you should be eating kale. And then I'm going to show you what you need to do with kale. Yes, you're going to be playing with your kale to make it taste a heck of a lot better. Because if you're like me, I'm a supertaster. It can be a bit bitter, but we're going to fix that. So why is kale so cool? Besides, it's kind of cute. It's filled with powerful antioxidants such as carotenoids and flavonoids, and those help protect against various cancers. First of all, total low calorie, nutrient dense food high in fiber. And 1 cup of kale leaves has only 36 calories, 5 grams of fiber, and of course, no fat. But we're not worried about fat anyway. Now, because it's such a great source of fiber. It's also great for digestion and detoxification. It's high in iron, and that's good for good liver function. And by the way, per calorie, kale has more iron than meat does. It also has more calcium per calorie than milk does. It's also high in vitamin A, which is great for your vision and for pretty skin. And vitamin C, which is important for your immune system, your metabolism, hydration and handling stress. Not like any of us have any of that. And vitamin K, which is really helpful for different cancers. And as we know, vitamin K is the partner of vitamin D. You need both of those for healthy bones and a great immune system. So you go to the store, you're sold, you're like, okay, jj, I'm eating my kale. So you go to the store and you're like, what? What do I do? Which do I pick? So let's go through a different couple different kales here and curly kale. Now I'm going to ask off camera, which is the curly kale? This one. This one. Okay, see, this is real life here so the curly kale is usually dark green or purple. And that's why it threw me because I got purple over here too. It's got little ruffled leaves. This is probably what you think of when you think of K. It's kind of pungent and peppery and bitter. The younger it is though, the less bitter it is. Do not buy old kale. Note to self. All right, next, this. I think this is the coolest looking kale ever. This is called la ciento or dino kale. It's got these really cool dark blue green leaves. I mean, look at this kind of wrinkly, firm texture. Actually, Susan, who just was telling me which kale was the curly kale was a little bit afraid of this kale. It's tall and narrow and it keeps this texture after it's cooked. So it's kind of fun too. As you can see that you can use this one to make all sorts of cool like roll ups and stuff. Now this is a little sweeter and a little more delicate than the curly kale over here. It's got this deep, earthy taste. It's not so bitter. It's a little bit sweet. So if you're like one of those bitter people like me, this dino kale is probably better for you. Okay. And the other one, red Russian kale. Check this out. It kind of looks like a big oak leaf or a large arugula leaf or maybe a cabbage. Kind of looks cabbage y, right? It's very fibrous. So with all of these, by the way, I'm going to show you how you're going to get those stems off. Because the stems are really where it's bittery and icky. So it's a little red, purpley. And by the way, this, this baby over here is the sweetest of the kales. Now how do you know what to look for? When you're looking for kale? You want it to be firm and deeply colored and have really hearty, hearty, thick stems. Okay. Then you want to keep in a cool environment. I keep it in my veggie produce, a little drawer in my fridge because if you put it into warm temperatures, it's going to wilt and then it will not taste good anymore. You want to look for fresh, unwilted, not brown or yellowing or holey kale. Right? So ideally to get smaller size leaves because they're more tender and they're milder than the big, big leaves. Probably those big leaves are the old leaves. Remember we said about don't get old kale. You can get kale all year long, and it's really though its peak from the middle of winter through the beginning of spring. All right? Then you get your kale, you're at the store, you bring it home, you put it in a plastic storage bag, and you try to get as much air out of the bag as possible and then put it in the fridge. And it keeps there for about five days. But you're going to eat it pretty quickly, right? Right now, the longer it's stored, the more bitter it gets. And you want to make sure that you don't wash it before you store it, because that'll make it spoil. Okay, now here's where things get really fun, because you're going to play with your kale. Why? When I say play with massage, kale is a really rough texture. And when you get that in your mouth, it's a lot to chew on and a lot to do before you can even start digesting it. When you massage it, it makes it easier for your body to handle, to digest and move through your body. And also it's going to make it not as bitter. It's going to taste better. So here's what you're going to see. As you massage your kale, it's going to start breaking down some of the cellulose. The leaves actually darken and shrink to half their size, becomes prettier, more vibrant green, and it actually tastes sweeter and less bitter. I was going to say sweeter and bitter, but it tastes sweeter and less bitter. So obviously this is what you want to do. The other thing you want to make sure is you're and you are going to pull the stems off the kale leaves. So Susan just taught me how to do this, by the way, I was doing it wrong. Although as long as you get the kale, the stems off the kale leaves, it's not wrong. Right? So you're going to pull off the stems. Now, I already de stemmed some, so you saw what I did. The way I did it is just folded over and then I grabbed and held onto and pulled. Okay, so you just grab your stems off. So now I've got this nice bowl here of kale. So here's where things get fun. We are going to now start massaging the kale. So what you want to do is you want to put a little bit of sea salt in here, little sea salt, a little bit of extra virgin olive oil, about a teaspoon, depends how much, of course, kale you have a little Lemon juice. What you want to think about here is these are your tenderizers. Okay. And then we're going to just start this. This little kneading action. And we're going to tear the kale leaves apart right as we're kneading through here and massaging and tearing and really working that lemon juice and olive oil and sea salt through. Kind of fun. Kind of fun. Now, here's what I would tell you is if you want to get your kids to eat kale, let them play with it. Let them play with their food. It's good to do. But, you know, the deal is, first time that you or your kids eat kale, you probably will not think this is the best thing you've ever had. But if you get more involved in an exposure equals preference. And if you can get your kids to get involved here, because you know what you make you want to eat, they'll be more likely to do it. There's all sorts of great things you can do with this kale. So you see, See how I'm doing this here? This is no big deal to do. So what do you do once you have this? Well, I love to use this in my salads, but I don't make just a straight kale salad. That's like a little bit too much kale. So what I'll do is I'll take kale and I'll use one of the salad choppers and chop it up pretty fine after massaging it. And then I'll add in some arugula and maybe some romaine or some spinach. So I add in a couple different things. It's also nice when you have this, if you have some extras. Toss it into your soup. Toss it into. If you're making a sauce, it's great to throw in. Toss it into a saute. Toss it in with some quinoa. But my favorite thing of all, so delicious. And one of those things that you can never make too many of because they're always going to go away, are kale chips. Now, in my Sugar Impact Diet Cookbook, I have chipotle kale chips, which is even better, because when you do chipotle, it actually boosts your metabolism. So I could actually call those fat burning kale chips. Yum. So, you know, if you look at the store, at the kale chips in the store, what I see with most of those kale chips is they are junk food. Sorry. Because they've thrown in nutritional yeast and a bunch of other stuff into there, and they've actually taken a good thing and made it really caloric without really adding a whole lot of good stuff to it. So this is one that you'll want to make at home. Really easy to do, so inexpensive too. And it's a great one to have your kids doing too. Makes it fun. And again, I have chipotle kale chips that I love, but you can do it with sea salt and black pepper. You could do some garlic. You can make these any way you want to. You can even sweeten them up a little bit with some cinnamon. The bottom line is, play with your kale, have fun with it, and start adding it to as many things as you can because you can't beat the nutrient density of kale.