Lentil Salad with Kale, Feta, and Olives

not everyone likes olives, so there are more olives for you

things you’ll need: kale (tuscan, lacinato, or dinosaur which are all different names for the same kale), black lentils (or green, but not red or brown), green castelvetrano olives (because they are particularly delicious and mild olives), scallions, garlic, lemon (peel and juice), cumin seeds, pepper flake, almonds, feta, oil, salt and pepper.

made in its entirety using this recipe from Sarah Jampel at Bon Appetit without changing a single thing because it’s practically perfect… unless you hate olive and kale.

incidentally gluten-free and vegetarian, sub vegan feta or just up the salt a tad.

Chapter 184

Sometimes we decide that we hate a food, convinced it wronged us at some point outside of our memory, certain our food trust was betrayed, shuttering with the mere utterance of its name. Sometimes we grow out of it and sometimes we never do.

Sometimes we tell people that we are allergic, just to avoid the whole conversation wherein they tell you how good it is and have you ever tried it cooked this way or you must have had it cooked that way and “you’ve never had MY” so on and so forth.

This is often the way with mushrooms, okra, and olives. Maybe it’s not you. Maybe you love olives, but one of the people you feed does not. Maybe they have been very brave in trying all sorts of other things (beans) that they thought they did not like (kale), but they have drawn the line at olives.

Maybe they even plead with you a little, like “I’ve been so good, but I REALLY don’t like them. Can’t we have beans or even fish soup?? Please? I can just make a sandwich.”

You aren’t mean or anything. You just got a recipe in your inbox that make you salivate and you want to make it because you really really want to eat it and you are the one that does the cooking, so it’s really up to you. Plus, you won’t have to share the leftovers.

Make some chicken so that your olive hater has something else to eat and you don’t have to share.

Start some black or green lentils. When the recipe suggests that you cook your lentils in plenty of salted water, like it’s pasta, you give it a go and are pleased that that there’s plenty more to learn in life. While your lentils boil away, prep some kale. Wash, strip, and chop/tear the leaves from the stems because the stems are fibrous and take forever to chew if you are eating them raw. Once your leaves are stripped, massage them with a little olive oil and salt to tenderize.

Drain your lentils when tender and set aside.

This is where the recipe hooked you: you are going to infuse an oil with cool stuff while toasting good stuff in the oil and then use the oil as a dressing base. Learning!

Trim a few scallions and separate the white parts from the green. Chop some raw almonds. Peel a few good strips of lemon peel. Smash a few cloves of garlic. Measure out a tablespoon of cumin seeds and a little chili flake.

Drop some olive oil in a hot skillet and add the white scallion bits, garlic, and lemon peel. Cook until the peels curl and the garlic starts to brown (but does not burn). Add almonds and keep stirring until they toast, keeping an eye on the garlic. Remove from heat and add the cumin seeds and chili flake.

Strain the skillet contents, reserving the oil for the dressing and the solids for the topping.

Smash, tear, or otherwise breakup some olives. Use more olives than it asks for because you love olives and your olive hater isn’t gonna eat it anyway. Crumble some feta.

Grab your massaged kale and dump in the smashed olives, feta, drained lentils, and green scallion bits. Squeeze in the juice from your peeled lemon, top with infused oil and salt to taste. Taste some more. Top with your skillet toasted topping and mix. Taste. Taste some more.

In the end, your olive hater will say “it’s actually really good” but will push all the olives to the side, which means you get to eat their olives too. Lucky you!

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