The weekend is here, and we at This Paper Ship are leisurely enjoying some fun studio time, as well as taking advantage of the temporary break from winter weather to go outside and plant some early spring crops. Today’s post on Rational Jar of Honey, however, reveals one of our methods of eating healthy, organic, and “local” during our insanely busy weeks: sprouting.
As you’ll see, sprouting is thankfully the quickest and easiest way of producing your own vegetables any time of the year. At roughly $3–4 per week for a household of two, it’s also one of the cheapest. You can find different versions of these directions in just about any “urban homesteading” book or site out there, but this is the method that’s worked best for us over the last year of tinkering with it.
YOU’LL NEED:
clean glass jar with lid
hammer and one nail
1/2 cup organic grain or bean of your choice (lentils are great for beginners)
clean water
(Note: getting organic grains/beans is actually a must for this. You don’t want to risk your sprouts having been treated with chemicals, since you’re probably going to want to eat at least a portion of them raw.)
BASIC DIRECTIONS:
1. Clean your jar and lid. (I’ve read about eating raw sprouts being associated with the mild threat of contamination, since the conditions in which you grow them are also ideal conditions for growing bacteria; making sure your materials are clean helps reduce that risk.)
2. Poke holes in the lid with hammer and nail.
3. Place about 1/2 cup of grain or bean in the jar and fill to the top with water. Leave to soak for 8 hours or overnight. Drain. (See note below for how to drain.)
4. Rinse 1–3 times daily: fill the jar with water and drain. You want the sprouts to be wet but not sitting in water, and changing out the water daily makes sure they don’t start to rot.
5. When your sprouts have grown to your liking (usually takes about 3–7 days depending on the grain/bean and the room temperature), place them in a different container and refrigerate. I usually try to eat them within a week.
A NOTE ON DRAINING: To get the water out of my jars quickly, I unscrew the cap and hold it tightly to the mouth of the jar as I turn it upside-down. Then return it right-side up and tap the top of the jar a couple of times to get stragglers to fall back down. (This is especially useful if you’re like me and you’re using a lid with holes in it rather than a mesh screen or fancy plastic sprouting lid.)
The reason we’re not sick of sprouts yet—and believe me, we eat them a LOT—is because they’re so versatile. So far we’ve added them to salads, the top of veggie pizzas, stir-frys, and eaten them for breakfast with fried eggs. We’ve also mixed them in with salmon & tuna patties, and—believe it or not—they make an incredible addition to meatloaf. If you’re inclined to eat “health food” that makes others turn up their noses, they’re also delicious as a snack mixed in with plain yogurt and honey.
What can you sprout? Popular stuff includes beans like adzuki, mung, lentil, chickpea, and soy, as well as grains like wheat berries and rice. Other sprouts people eat include the ones from your typical vegetables like broccoli and radishes. We have yet to do much exploration, but we’re proceeding with caution, because there are risks involved, such as the risk of eating too many legumes like kidney beans messing with your system. Before you embark, just make sure you read up on it. It’s totally worth the research and effort; sprouting is a LOT of fun, and it’s a GREAT way of getting a lot of nutrition when you have very little money and/or access to good, fresh vegetables.
—Joel
P.S. If you don’t have a good natural food store nearby and you’re at a loss for where to find organic seeds, grains, and beans, you can order them online! A good Google search will point you in the right direction, or you can check out larger online retailers like Amazon.
by Joel and Ashley
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