Kale Salad
“As on eyes are open, so one can understand when the heart is open.”
~Hazrat Inayat Khan~ The Bowl of Saki
Ingredients:
-1 bunch organic Kale (shred into bowl)
-Add any combination of the following:
-1 handful pomegranate seeds
-1 handful toasted walnuts/pumpkin seeds/etc.
-1/2 Avocado, sliced
For dressing:
-1/8 cup olive oil
-1/8 cup hemp oil
-1 knuckle ginger
-1/2 peeled orange, remove seeds
-1 tsp Bragg’s raw apple cider vinegar
-3 tsp Bragg’s amino acids
-splash of fresh squeezed lime juice
Directions:
Blend dressing in Cuisinart or chopper. Pour as much as you like on the salad and then refrigerate the remainder. Salad can be eaten right away or marinated overnight. Yum!
Nutrition Information
The beautiful leaves of the kale plant provide an earthy flavor and more nutritional value for fewer calories than almost any other food around. Exactly how kale’s sulfur-containing phytonutrients prevent cancer is not yet fully understood, but several researchers point to the ability of its glucosinolates and cysteine sulfoxides to activate detoxifying enzymes in the liver that help neutralize potentially carcinogenic substances. For example, scientists have found that sulforaphane, a potent glucosinolate phytonutrient found in kale and other Brassica vegetables, boosts the body’s detoxification enzymes, potentially by altering gene expression, thus helping to clear potentially carcinogenic substances more quickly. Sulforaphane, which is formed when cruciferous vegetables such as kale are chopped or chewed, triggers the liver to produce enzymes that detoxify cancer-causing chemicals, inhibits chemically-induced breast cancers in animal studies, and induces colon cancer cells to commit suicide. A study of Chinese women in Singapore, a city in which air pollution levels are often high putting stress on the detoxification capacity of residents’ lungs, found that in non-smokers, eating cruciferous vegetables lowered risk of lung cancer by 30%. In smokers, regular cruciferous vegetable consumption reduced lung cancer risk an amazing 69%! Human population as well as animal studies consistently show that diets high in cruciferous vegetables, such as kale, are associated with lower incidence of a variety of cancers, including lung, colon, breast and ovarian cancer. Now, research published in the International Journal of Cancer (Zhao H, Lin J) suggests that bladder cancer can join the list.