Sausage and Kale Gnocchi

2 sausages – The ones I used were apple butter flavoured that I got at the Kitchener Market. I would try and choose a flavour that is sweet for this recipe, although a spicy sausage could also give this dish a nice kick!

½ red onion, sliced

1 bunch of kale*, stems removed

2-3 springs of sage, chopped

2 tbsp butter - This is optional depending on how fatty the sausages were. The ones I had were quite lean. I used avocado-based margarine.

1 pkg President’s choice butternut squash gnocchi

Parmesan for topping

Optional – red pepper flakes – I didn’t use it when I made this recipe but I think it could have used a bit of heat since I used sweet sausages with the sweet gnocchi.

1) Remove meat from sausage casing (discard casing) and into a frying pan on medium high heat. Smash it up into smaller bits. (If you would like to add the red pepper flakes, do that now). Cook for ~5min

2) Add in red onion and cook for ~5min

3) Add in kale and extra optional butter and cook for another ~5min

4) After kale has mostly wilted, add in gnocchi and sage and cook until gnocchi is tender (~5-10min)

5) Throw into a bowl and top with parmesan cheese

6) Enjoy :)

For 1/2 the recipe:

Energy: 597kcal

Protein: 21g**

Fat: 30g (8g saturated fat, 11g MUFA and 4g PUFA if you used the avocado margarine too)

CHO: 64g

Fibre: 8g (31% of your DRI)

*No one likes kale. If you say you like kale, you’re lying. But kale made it’s debut in the Canadian diet when someone decided this glorified garnish was a “super food” (I’ll be making a video about my thoughts on that buzzword soon enough). In regard to its vitamin content, they weren’t wrong. Kale is packed with tons of heart healthy vitamins and fibre. What’s really interesting is that kale is known for its vitamin K content – which is crucial for blood clotting*** – and when kale is cooked the vitamin K content increases. This is the same for the vitamin A. Unfortunately, most vitamins degrade in high heat, so there is a trade-off and the vitamin C content decreases – but I mean, were you really eating kale for the vitamin C anyway?

** While figuring out the nutrition facts for this recipe, I learned that kale has 3g of protein per cup. What the what?

***If you are currently on a blood thinner called Warfarin, you should avoid foods high in vitamin K because it will counteract the medication’s mechanism of action (AKA, they cancel each other out).