Name: Kale
Age: At least 2,400 years old.
Appearance: Curly, green and, for the past few years, ubiquitous.
Someone tried to serve me kale roulade at a dinner party last week. I had to, er, leave. You might be able to stay put at the next one – a kale crisis looms.
Really? Tell me more! A dry summer and an EU ban on nicotinoid pesticides means that a plague of aphids is upon us.
And what? Don’t tell me – hipster cafes were frying them in a light tempura batter and sprinkling them atop kale salads. Without them, the snack du jour is ruined. No. Much simpler. Not a modern tale, but one as old as time – the insects have attacked brassica crops, including cauliflower, broccoli and cabbage, as well as kale. Unless growing conditions remain perfect from hereon out, this will cause a superfood shortage.
How will all the Gwyneth-a-likes manage? It doesn’t bear thinking about. Where will they get their daily doses of beta-carotene, vitamin K, vitamin C, sulforaphane, indole-3-carbinol and bile acid sequestrants now?
And smugness. Don’t forget the smugness. You would be smug, too, if you were banishing cancer, wrinkles, bowel woes and cholesterol in one fell swoop.
And joy. You banish joy if you’re forever chewing on a fibrous bale of bitter greens. There are lots of ways to improve those aspects of this wonderfood.
Mm-hm. Any of them wholly successful? The Italian method of calling it cavolo nero and drowning small portions of it in cream, cheese, olive oil and spaghetti seems to work best.
I am almost persuaded. And in Sweden, they chop it up, fry it with cream, pepper and syrup. That’s called langkal.
Ah, Swedish for: “Let’s address this problem head on – ADD SUGAR!” I presume. But really, you should try my local cafe’s kale, oat and banana smoothie. It’s to die for, if it wasn’t going to make you live for ever.
You should try my local cafe’s egg, bacon and hash browns. You will die, but happy.
Do say: “I add kale to my morning vaginal steam. Gwynnie’s nethers swear by it.”
Don’t say: “My local cafe serves bone-marrow toasties. I am writing to my MP.”
