What I Made: June 13, 2012

Yesterday I decided to take it a little easy on the cooking/baking and make a nice dinner with a drink.  For as little as I made, I sure did make one heck-of-a mess in my kitchen.

I've heard much bally-hoo about kale.  Everyone has wanted me to try it, cook with it, make it into chips... blah blah blah.  So this evening I decided to make a Pasta with a Kale and Walnut Pesto.  I got the recipe from Real Simple's May 2012 issue. I partnered it with another recipe from that same issue of Real Simple - Spring Lettuces with Avocado Dressing and Pistachios.

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Pasta with Kale & Walnut Pesto and
Spring Lettuces with Avocado Dressing & Pistachios

I really enjoyed the salad.  The tangy and creamy dressing partnered well with the salty pistachios and crispy lettuce.  

The kale pesto... eh, not so much.

I'm going to chalk it up to kale being an acquired taste.  I decided to do a little research on my green nemesis and got the following from Cook's Thesaurus:

Kale is a kind of cabbage with dark green, wrinkled leaves.  It's prized more for its hardiness than its flavor or delicacy, but it continues to be popular in the South, where it's often cooked as a side dish.  Remove and discard the tough center stalks before cooking.

Now it makes sense why I don't like it:

1. It's a cabbage, which I really dislike.
2. It's known for it's hardiness than flavor or delicacy - two of my favorite things.
3. It's usually a side dish... not a main dish pesto base.

I was hoping that the Homemade Ginger Ale from the archives of All You's April 2011 issue would cleanse my palate.

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Homemade Ginger Ale

I was really shocked at how bitter it was.  Seriously, you drink 1/4 cup of sugar in each glass and it wasn't sweet at all.

So kind of a disappointing food day.  Hopefully, today will be better.  It's already started out well with a great smoothie for breakfast and a fancy grilled cheese for lunch, but I'm getting ahead of myself again.  I'll update you tomorrow about that!

Until then... happy cooking!