Super Cheesy Baked Vegan Kale Chips
What is your fatal flaw?
Balder’s, Achille’s heel was mistletoe.
Superman’s was kryptonite
Achille’s heel was of course his heel
Oedipus’ fatal flaw was , well, his mom (I made it dark)
My mother’s fatal flaw was potato chips. Salty, crunchy, spicy chips brittle and crisp. She could polish of a bag in one sitting as could I her daughter who inherited her penchant for salty crunchy foods.
The Day we Struck Gold in the Rocky Mountains
Years ago in a little town in the Rocky Mountains my son and I discovered kale chips. Not just kale chips but super cheesy baked kale chips in tiny expensive bags at the health food store.
Like old time miners in a gold rush we fairly leapt about the store throwing our picks in the air screaming “we’re rich!”.
Well actually since our mouths were full of smokey, crunchy, cheesy chips what came out was more of a garbled “Oh whow theshe ahre ahmazhing!”
“Time wounds all heels”
-my dad
On our walk home that day, along the winding road to our B&B we made up a song about our kale chips as we munched a king’s ransom in health food store snacks. We were so engrossed in our snacks that we didn’t notice the herd of elks trying to cross the road not 20 feet in front of us.
We halted both our song and our munching and waited silently for them to cross. It was rutting season and the thousand pound males were demented demons terrorizing the townsfolk. So we stood until they had passed, the hushed nickers and gentle footfalls, the moist snorting and musky smell of dense ungulate fur filling the morning air.
You mean I’ll have a bad heel?” I said. “Couldn’t I just, like, wear something besides sandals? No offense.”
– Rick Riordan, The last Olympian
We followed the path along the stream blooming with columbines and verdant with ferns until we reached our little hideaway and were greeted by our host’s sad eyed basset hound Elvis.
We sat in the soft grass, stroking Elvis’s velvet ears, and reached into our now empty bags of kale chips. My boy Aylam cocked an eyebrow and gestured towards the bags. I nodded and pointed to my wallet. We stood in silence and headed back along the gurgling stream towards the health food store quielty singing our Super Cheesy baked Kale chip song.
Some of my favorite snacks:
Check out my Aquafaba page! For tips, tricks and to see all of my Aquafabulous recipes.
Super Cheesy Baked Vegan Kale Chips
A crispity crunchity alternative to potato chips. I used to be a bonafide bbq chip addict. I admit I was powerless over the gravitational pull of a bag of chips. I’m pretty sure that evenly uncouth teenaged self would have snacked her way through a bag of these.
- 1 bunch Kale
- 1/2 tbsp oil of your choice, I used olive
- 2 tbsp nutritional yeast
- 1 tsp garlic powder
- 1 tsp onion powder
- 1 tsp smoked paprika
- 1 pinch salt, or to taste
- 1 tbsp tomato paste
Heat your oven to 300 degrees Fahrenheit. Line two large baking with parchment or foil.
Take out a large bowl. De-stem your kale leaves, put the stems aside in the compost. Only weirdos like me like to munch on kale ribs. Rip the leaves into bite size pieces and place in a large bowl.
Toss in the rest of the ingredients.Pull up your sleeves, wash your hands and get to massaging. Give the kale a good two minute massage.
Dump half of the kale onto each cookie sheet and spread as thinly as possible. Press down on any large clumps you want a uniform-is thickness.
Place in oven and bake 15 minutes. Switch trays and rotate them as well(meaning the front of the pan should now be facing the back). Bake another 15 minutes until the kale seems quite dry.
Remove form the oven and allow to cook 5 minutes.
This recipe works great in the dehydrator as well. Dehydrate on a low setting for bout 8 hours and you will have lovely crisp kale chips.
I can’t even hazard a wild guess as to how many kale chips it takes to fill up a teenage boy’s stomach. Something in the ballpark of the number of grains of sand on a tropical Beach? These home-made ones look delicious. It’s a delight to see that quoted line of Father’s – one of his classics that I almost forgot. BTW, I enjoyed your interview with Alison Leslie Gold on her blog ( http://www.alisonlesliegold.com/?p=4619 )!
Trick question, cause teenaged boys are bottomless pits. Ha!