i ate some cold leftover ribs for lunch before biking to market basket with my cargo bike to pick up some seltzer and kale. the beverages turned out to be not on sale so i left with just some kale, a bag of salad, and 2 cartons of pink grapefruit juice.

i tried making some kale chips today. i had some before, something my sister had made. i figured it'd be a healthier alternative to my usual processed snacks. i looked up a bunch of recipes and came down to this one: cut kale leaves from stems, ripped into sizable pieces, wash and then dry in salad spinner, hand-rubbed with a bit of olive oil and kosher salt, layered on a parchment paper covered baking sheet, and baked for 25 minutes at 300°F.

with half a bunch of kale i managed to make 3 batches of chips. since i was using the oven anyway, i put in a pan of sweet potato as well on the bottom tray (50 minutes). i tossed out the kale stems before reading that i could use them in a smoothie so picked them back out of the trash can. 25 minutes to bake a tray might seem excessive, i'll probably make them for less time next time. the chips were crispy, but almost too crispy, sort of falling apart in my mouth as kale dust.

making a smoothie gave me a chance to use the ninja master prep pro my mother and i picked up from target on black friday weekend. it was for my sister, but she never bothered to take it home, so my mother gave it to me instead. the ninja master differs from other blenders in that the spin assembly is on top, not the bottom, and the blades are stacked in layers.

i added a cup of frozen fruit (been in my fridge since the summer), a cup of chopped kale stems, and a cup of pink grapefruit juice. normally i'd also add a banana or some yogurt, but i had neither. blending was fast and power, i pulsed it a few more times for added measure. the resulting smoothie was more of an icy slushie, which is hard to drink when the weather is so cold. it also wasn't sweet because i didn't use any sweet ingredients. the kale stems added a surprising crunch to each sip.

i noticed it when i went to go wash my hands, but i was bleeding from a finger. i was careful with the ninja blades, but i still managed to get sliced without knowing it, just a thin sliver but still enough to bleed. i put a bandaid on it but later used the liquid skin polish (it hurt like crazy but once dried i didn't notice it anymore).

finally, i finished cooking my sweet potatoes. even after 50 minutes at 300°F in the oven they weren't ready, so put them in the toaster oven at 350°F for another hour. after 30 minutes when i went to go check some of the spuds were already leaking syrup. after an hour i turned off the oven.

for dinner i ate some sweet potatoes. i was surprised that i felt hungry soon afterwards, and made some xi'an paomo.