Fresh from The Spring Farm: Kale growing tips and a recipe for Roasted Squash and Kale Salad

By Jenny Spring

I grow three types of kale for the Huntsville market.

1. Black Kale (Dino Kale)
2. Red Russian Kale
3. Siberian Kale (green curly – great for smoothies)

Kale loves the cold so you can plant it very early in the spring. In fact, it can handle frost and a light snow and the cold improves the taste. One great tip is to plant the kale in the fall and it will come up very early in the spring.

Kale has a biennial life cycle that takes two years to complete. In the first year, kale produces an abundance of leaves. Overwintered kale grows new leaves and sends up flower stalks with pretty yellow flowers in the spring of its second year. When the flowers die, they leave seed pods that you can break open when ripe for a new crop of kale seeds.

Kale is a great vegetable to grow as it produces so much and grows very well in our climate.

My personal advice is be careful of the flee beetle. The flee beetle hides in the soil in the early spring and will eat all brassica plants or spicy greens. I put a row cover over my crops so the bugs don’t eat all my kale plants.

The recipe this week is my all time favourite by 101cookbooks (http://www.101cookbooks.com)

Roasted Squash and Kale Salad

Ingredients:

• 2 pound / 8 oz / 230 g small fingerling potatoes, washed and dried
• 3/4 pound / 12 oz / 340 g delicata squash
• 1/4 cup / 60 ml extra virgin olive oil
• 1/4 cup / 50 ml white miso
• 1 tablespoon harissa paste
• 3 tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon juice
• 1 1/2 ounce / 45 g kale, de-stemmed and finely chopped
• 4 radishes, very thinly sliced
• 1 1/2 ounces / 45g Marcona almonds, toasted pepitas, or other toasted nuts

Instructions:

Preheat the oven to 400F

Slice potatoes into pieces no larger than your thumb

Cut the delicata squash in half length-wise, and use a spoon to clear out all the seeds. Cut into 1/2-inch wide half-moons. You can leave the peel on these squash.

In a small bowl whisk together olive oil, miso, harissa. Place the potatoes and squash in a large bowl with 1/3 cup / 80 ml of the miso-harissa oil. Use your hands to toss well, then turn everything out onto a baking sheet. Bake until everything is baked through and browned, about 25-30 minutes. Toss once or twice along the way after things start to brown a bit.

In the meantime, whisk the lemon juice into the remaining miso-harissa oil. Taste. You can dilute it with a bit more olive oil or lemon juice. Stir the kale into the leftover dressing and set aside.

Place the warm roasted vegetables in a bowl and toss with the kale mixture, radishes, and almonds.

Jenny Spring and Oliver Wolfe are co-owners of The Spring Farm with Andrea and Brian Currie. Each week, Jenny will share a recipe featuring in-season, Muskoka-grown produce from their local farm, which is just five kilometres from downtown Huntsville. She’ll also share a gardening tip about the chosen vegetable. You can find these vegetables and more at the Huntsville Farmers’ market on Thursdays after Victoria Day in the Canadian Tire parking lot, or at The Spring Farm gate on Bethune Road North starting in June.

Don’t miss out on Doppler! Sign up for our free, twice-weekly newsletter here.