[Chuck says for my student followers especially, I should list cost and time to prepare. I'll start doing this in the title, but so that no one is confused, I preface this with this preface. The feta and pine nuts are the most expensive part of this: prepared this way, you'll spend probably six or seven dollars on the whole thing, which will feed at least four people all the way full (or one Chuck and one Emily and one lunch). If you buy the kale cut and cleaned, the rice takes the longest to prepare at 40 minutes. Assembly is 3 minutes.]
One of my colleagues felt so out of place in a small town in the South ("Butt freak!" "Film Buff!" -- nothing like some Canadians to put the South in perspective) -- with its culture of tradition-uber-alles and unhealthy ideas about food, and backwoods backassward politics. When she got the chance to go back west, she went; she now lives where she and her dog and her husband can walk for hours in all directions, or bike, and never have to contend with religious nuts, uncaring writer/students, fried Twinkies on a stick.
She introduced me to our local CSA (community supported agriculture), which I've dropped given its sheer cost and its erratic production and distribution. But while I was in the co-op, the only one around here by the way, I ended up one day in fall with a shitload of something green and leafy. The tag said "kale" (wow! and healthy, too). I'd never heard of it. Really. Seriously. Never heard of it. So I sent an email or something, maybe made some phone calls: "I have this stuff called 'kale.' What the hell do I do with it?"
I didn't check the internet. I still don't trust it easily for recipes. Ironic, that.
My colleague responded. She told me she had the best, easiest, tastiest preparation for kale ever. Her friend in California told her about it.
We tried it. We discovered that kale is in fact vegetable crack (best drug website there is). One puff and you will sell your children for it.
The trick to this is to eat kale in season, which for here, is right now. I have 30 kale plants in my garden almost ready to harvest. I say almost. They're biggish, and we just had a frost, but I want to wait just a little more; except I don't, and so I bought a bag of kale and made this last night.
Also, this tells me how much you'll need, too, so -- that's good, right?
Anyway, this is fall-winter-early spring ONLY.
What you'll need:
about 6 cups cooked rice (brown is better)
1/4-1/2 cup pine nuts
soy sauce, crushed garlic, hot peppers, olive oil
In a lightly oiled pan, toast the pine nuts over medium heat. Be careful: they burn FAST. Keep them moving in the pan until about half of them are golden brown. Take the pan off the heat and let them sit while you fix the rest.
In a very large stockpot with a lid, put about 2 TBSP olive oil and heat until you can smell it. Add about a tsp of crushed garlic, and enough hot pepper stuff to affect your sinuses. Stir for just a minute. 
Dump in the kale and keep moving it against the bottom until it's half-reduced in size. 
Turn off the heat and cover to let the kale steam. Stir once or twice. When it's done, it'll release a little water and be about a quarter the volume of the original kale.
In a deep bowl, layer the rice, then the kale and its juices, then the pine nuts, then the feta. Often I bake this a little in a 350 oven just to toast some of the edges of the kale and soften the cheese, but that's not strictly necessary. It's ready to go once the layers are done.
My mother, who thinks "vegetarian food" means "nasty shit poor people who can't afford steak eat" downed three bowls of this in a single sitting. It's good stuff.
There you go.
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