The kale and garlic go into the blender raw? And I assume Cook a bit when it meets the heat from the pasta?

It sounds like you cook the kale and whole garlic cloves in the pasta water for 5 min and then retrieve it carefully with tongs and then blend it. Best to keep the kale leaves as whole as possible then; otherwise it would be almost impossible to fish it back out! An unusual technique, but it seems that he’s just trying to keep everything as simple as possible in this recipe.