Wintergarden
Before I knew it, in New York, it was hard to find a restaurant that didn’t have kale on the menu. The reason kale was and still is such a key component of a vegetable-based diet is because of the endless health benefits. It is one of the densest greens, which means it is high in fiber and filling. There is more calcium in a cup of kale than a glass of milk. It is chock-full of Vitamins K, E, B and C, and is loaded with cancer-fighting antioxidants and amino acids. It’s no surprise the American health community labeled it a “superfood.” It only made sense that my macrobiotic/ vegetarian mother made sure kale was a staple the minute I started eating solid food. There was no dessert if I did not eat my kale. And just as some people have nostalgic memories with certain comfort foods, perhaps with mom’s homemade macaroni and cheese or grandma’s secret chocolate brownie recipe, I associate comfort and safety
with kale. And when you move to a new country where you can barely speak the language, being without your comfort food is not always ideal. By November when I finally accepted that kale was not all of a sudden going to appear, and after smuggling back a few bunches from England and Italy, I had an epiphany: instead of just complaining about the lack of kale in Paris, what if I brought kale to Paris? And with that, The Kale Project was born. The plan was to find a farmer, preferably organic, who would be open-minded to growing the vegetable to create supply. Then I would try to find a restaurant that would want to incorporate kale into their menu to create demand. Of course it would not be any old Paris café, but instead one of the newer restaurants owned by fellow Angloexpats, since they would already be familiar with the vegetable. Plus their patrons are a mixture of expats and 04 /1 2
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