Crispy Baked Kale Chips - A Healthy Snack!

If you are married (or living with your significant other), there is a great chance that you have trouble finding healthy snacks for them. If you are being honest, you know they sneak into the cookies (you know, the full pack of oreos you just bought... you find there is already only one left), they eat your baking supplies (like Hersheys kisses, baking chips etc), and potato chips are their favorite snack. Talking to some of my cousins and friends, I realize that I am not alone in this. They have to hide the Oreos, hide the baking supplies and set aside the chips that are suppose to go with the burgers for this Friday night! Let's be honest with each other ladies... we all know this is common.

When we started trying to conceive, I was looking up recipes, snacks and such that I could try and sneak in so my husbands ehhhummmm "trying to conceive parts" would stay healthy. I read that the more folate the better. Ok, what has folate? I kept coming across kale. kale kale kale. So what is kale?

Let's just say, that when most people look at kale, they are thinking... what am I suppose to do with this? It is very dense, comes in green or purple leaves and does not form a head like lettuce. I had never worked with kale before, and was very nervous! I came across kale chips all over the internet. Kale. Chips. "Ok," I thought.... "this could work". So I made them for my husband, hoping that this would replace potato chips and some of the other snacks, at least a portion of the time. He LOVES them. I mean LOVES. He actually asked me if I could just have the baked kale chips around all the time. I thought, "IT'S A MIRACLE!". It took me several trials and errors to figure out how to get them perfect.

So here is what you do.

• Grab your kale at the grocery store, in the produce section. Maybe start off with one bunch this time. 
• Preheat oven to 350
• Kale has a big stem in the middle of each leaf. Tear the leaves from the stem, and discard the stem.
• Lay out on a cookie sheet, and spray with olive oil cooking spray. Don't spray too much, or your kale will end up being soggy. Just lightly coat. Its ok if you don't get every piece of every leaf. You just want to coat enough for your salt to stick.
• Sprinkle with sea salt 
• Bake for about 12 minutes. I keep a close eye on them, as sometimes it just takes longer, and sometimes, its too long. I can't explain why, it just does. When they start to get crisp, take the sheet out of the oven, and touch them to see if they are crisp. What I have found, is that more times than not, there are a few that haven't gotten crisp like the rest, so I will take off the ones that are done, and put the ones that didn't quite get there, back in for a few minutes.
• I put in a large ziplock, but don't close it. When I have closed them in the past, they get soggy again. 

Your end result will look something like this:

Try it out. Like I said, my husband absolutely loves this. I have to do my part now, and keep them in this house as a healthy snack!

Enjoy!