These Easy Kale Chips are a great vegan, gluten free and paleo friendly snack. They’re so simple to make and have the perfect amount of crunch & saltiness!
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It’s heeere! It’s a new year, and you’re all fired up and you’re gonna eat super healthy and workout every day and eat all your veggies… right? Well… I mean… it seems like everyone on social media is! I’m not hating on the New Year’s resolution-ers here at all… in fact… I WAS a New Year’s resolution-er. When I was away at college I felt like total junk from eating the dining hall food that was loaded with preservatives and god knows what else. (And also probably from the weekends of drinking and late night buffalo chicken pizza eating… lets be real). When I came home on winter break feeling blah, Tyler convinced me to go to the gym and start eating a little bit healthier.
Now, let’s just take a step back. I am a person who NEVER (and I mean never) worked out. With the exception of a brief stint as a cheerleader (which I quickly retired from after breaking my ankle), I never did any physical activity. I ate relatively healthy foods, didn’t participate in sports, and was totally cool with it my whole life. But once I went away to school, and started eating more junk food and just not feeling well overall, I knew that needed to change.
So after ringing in the new year, I started to go to the gym and ‘clean eating’. I slowly phased out any junk foods, cut back on my sugar/alcohol intake, and started eating more veggies + trying new ingredients in my recipes. Within about a year, I had lost about 20 pounds, I felt like a new person, and I knew that it wasn’t a fad for me. To this day – I haven’t stopped.
I share this story mainly to say: imagine what could happen if instead of laughing at the person using a machine wrong at the gym, you walked over and showed them how to do it correctly. Or instead of rolling our eyes at your high school friend posting about their new workout program – you actually encouraged them to stick to it and offered your advice? Just sayin’ we could do big things here people.
The second reason I share this story is because I wasn’t just born athletic and loving vegetables. While there are some people who talk about being perfect athletes from the time they were a toddler or those people who always choose a salad over a burger… I’m totally not one of them. And if you had told me 4 years ago that I would be writing a blog post about kale chips I would have actually laughed in your face.
Which brings me to the recipe…While I always ate salads and veggies growing up, I never liked kale. Real talk: When not prepared correctly, it’s bitter, it just tastes gross, and when you saute it it’s like you’re eating soupy grass. I couldn’t stand it, and it’s still not my favorite vegetable. For years I would really only eat it in smoothies, aside from some failed kale chip attempts. Every time I would make them they would either burn (making the gross taste 100x worse) or they would come out half crispy, half soggy… Bleh.
I’d pretty much given up on kale until I was at the farmers market the other day and saw this giant bunch of locally grown kale. For whatever reason, I just felt the need to buy it. When I got home I decided I’d give kale chips another try.. this time at a lower temperature for longer time, instead of at a higher temp for just a few minutes. I figured it would have a similar effect to a dehydrator…. and surprisingly enough – it totally worked! The chips came out so good that I wound up buying more kale at the farmers market the next week to make another batch.
If you’re someone who craves crunchy, salty snacks – then you have to try these. They have the perfect amount of crisp, they’re spicy from the pepper, and just a little bit salty… plus they’re SO simple to make!
Things we used for this recipe: baking sheets, olive oil spray, Himalayan sea salt, pepper
Easy Kale Chips
Ingredients
- 2-4 cups of kale approximately 6 large stems ripped into 1 inch pieces
- olive oil spray
- salt
- pepper
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 300
- Cover a large baking sheet with olive oil spray
- Lay out kale on the baking sheet so it doesn’t overlap
- Spray kale with olive oil spray and sprinkle generously with salt and pepper.
- Bake for 10-15 minutes, and then flip + bake for an additional 10-15 minutes until the edges start to crisp up
- Allow to cool + store in an airtight container
Layne Fable says
Can’t wait to try these!!!
The Clean Eating Couple says
Hope you love them, Layne!
Sarah says
I ALWAYS burn my kale chips! I will have to try this method. I also totally agree about helping out newbies in the gym. I get so mad when I hear people make fun of others in the gym or even about those memes or videos that go viral making fun of people. If you’re into fitness and health why would you discourage people who are trying? Haha you got me heated.
The Clean Eating Couple says
Right?!! It’s so mean! It makes me so mad. Try out this method for your kale chips, I think you’ll love them!
Linz @ Itz Linz says
kale chips are definitely awesome – i haven’t made any in so long – need to change that!
The Clean Eating Couple says
They’re my new favorite snack 🙂 So tasty!!
Taylor says
This is so easy! I will have to give it a try! Great post!
The Clean Eating Couple says
Thanks Taylor! Hope you enjoy them 🙂
Lora @ Crazy Running Girl says
I might have to try these!
The Clean Eating Couple says
Yes! You totally should, Lora!