Sweet Potato, Black Bean & Kale Skillet from Goop

I wanted to dislike Goop, Gwyneth Paltrow's online column. The whole idea of a multi-milionaire beautiful movie actress daring to give advice and thoughts to regular people over the interwebs struck me as so downright patronizing. "This is how you lose weight," I expected to read, "Just eat less, it couldn't be easier!" I eagerly dove into the column, looking forward to picking on her "fashion tips" which I was sure would include lots of ultra-expensive designer clothing, or travel suggestions including private planes and the like. After reading her columns for a few years now, for sure there has been some of that, but along the way something else happened.

I started saying "ooh that looks good!" when I was reading the columns more often than not. For what I thought was an out-of-touch celebrity, Gwyneth sure had a lot of good ideas. Despite my best efforts, she was winning me over.

Today she won the war. I saw this recipe for a Sweet potato, black bean, and kale skillet in her latest issue, and this recipe is right up our alley! In fact I have made something similar in the past which we quite enjoyed. I wanted to see if Gwyneth's recipe would be better, and I'll be damned if it wasn't.

Sweet Potato, Black Bean and Kale Skillet

ingredients 

serves 2-4

• 2 sweet potatoes, peeled
• 1 can black beans
• 2 hearty handfuls kale, torn into bite-size pieces (can substitute 1 bunch any greens)
• 1 lime
• olive oil
• pinch of sumac (I substituted seville orange rind for this, you could also substitute lime peel instead)
• pinch of cumin
• sea salt
• freshly ground pepper
• habanero sauce (I added this to make it spicy!)

SERVE WITH:
-- tortillas (corn or wheat)
-- avocado
-- sour cream or plain yogurt
-- minced cilantro (optional)

preparation

1.Cut sweet potatoes in half lengthwise. Lay cut surface flat on a cutting board and slice in half again lengthwise. Then, slice into ¼ inch thick pieces. 

2.Place large sauté pan over medium high heat and drizzle with olive oil. Add sweet potatoes, sumac and cumin to pan and cook for a minute until they begin to brown, stirring throughout to coat (if you wait to add salt and pepper, the potatoes will brown up a little better). Cover after a minute, bring the heat down to medium and let cook for about 5-8 minutes, stirring once or twice, until they’ve softened up.

3.Add black beans. Stir to mix. Add kale, season with salt and pepper, mix and cover. Let cook for 2-3 minutes, uncover and stir. (If it's feeling a bit too dry at this point, drizzle a little more olive oil.) Cook for another minute or so until kale is cooked to your liking.

4.Drizzle with lime and serve with avocado slices, cilantro, warm tortillas and sour cream if desired.

** for baby food, make the vegetable mixture without salt and pepper, puree some for baby, and then salt and pepper the rest for the adults.