The Many Benefits of Kale

Kale has reached “IT” status in the past few years, thanks to celebrity coverage on entertainment magazines, hipster statements, and Beyonce’s sweatshirt.

It is so popular that it has made its way into smoothies, chips, and designer salads and is featured in just about every farm to table menu. No other crucifer has reached this kind of popularity (not that there’s a contest for most popular cruciferous vegetable). Kale just makes you cool.

What is kale anyway?

Kale belongs to theBrassicaceae family, commonly called crucifers, which include a long list of nutrient packed veggies like: broccoli, cabbage, cauliflower, bok choy, rocket, brussel sprouts, collard greens, mustard greens, napa cabbage, rutabaga, rapini, arugula, watercress, mizuna, turnips, kohlrabi, romanesco, and horseradish.

Kale is one tough vegetable. It is rarely affected by frost, unlike your other salad greens, like iceberg lettuce or romaine. Therefore, it can be grown in colder regions and can be available all year round.

What makes kale popular isn’t its celebrity endorsements orthe fact that it has its own holiday (it’s the first Wednesday in October, if you’re curious). What makes kale popular is the many benefits of eating kale.

Kale is very low in calories and has zero fat

One cup of kale has 36 calories, 5 grams of fibre, and zero grams of fat.

Kale is as power packed as far as veggies can get

It is loaded with vitamins and nutrients like Vitamins A, B6, C, and K, plus Calcium, Iron, Thiamin, Folate, Manganese, Riboflavin, Potassium. Kale has even more iron than beef and 1 cup of it contains more vit C. than an orange. Even more impressive is the fact that 1 cup of kale contains 7x the RDA of vit K.

Kale has antioxidants

Kale is also power packed with antioxidants such as Quercetin, Beta-Carotene, Kaempferol, Flavonoids, and Polyphenols.

Kale is anti-inflammatory

Kale has a healthy ratio of Omega-3 and Omega-6 fatty acids that help fight arthritis, asthma, and some autoimmune issues. In fact, 1 cup of kale is already 10% of the RDA of Omega-3.

Kale helps you detoxify

The reason why kale smoothies are so popular is because kale has  “isothiocyanates” that help you detox and keep your liver healthy.

Kale helps support a healthy heart

Eating kale can help reduce cholesterol levels and support cardiovascular functions.

With all these benefits, it isn’t a mystery that kale has made it as the IT superfood and the coolest veggie in town and that's just another reason why we included in our supergreens Green Goddess.