Sprouting is Good for the Soul

Sprouting is really easy. And sprouts are tasty.

Not having a garden or an allotment, the only thing I could really grow (except my window box of herbs and a pot of lavender, see post below) was sprouts. I started small and grew some Puy lentil and chickpea sprouts. And you don't need one of those fancy sprouter thingies they sell in health food shops.

Here's how you do it.

1.Get an old plastic see-through container (you don't need the lid)and an old pair of tights (preferably nude-coloured).

2. Select a seed or bean to sprout - so far, I've only experimented with puy lentil and chickpea, but there's a whole host of stuff you can sprout out there. Some of it you need to buy seeds for, like broccoli sprouts (which apparently contain 50x the antioxidants than the heads we usually eat). You can also sprout a lot of stuff in your cupboard though - any kind of dried bean or pea, like aduki beans, or seeds like mustard.

3. Soak the lentil/pea/ overnight in a jar of water so that they swell in size.

4. Rinse them and spread them out (not too thickly) in the bottom of your plastic container.

5. Squeeze the container inside the old pair of tights and place in daylight or in the dark, but not in direct sunlight.




6. Rinse the sprouts twice a day and leave them slightly damp, but not sodding in the container. Watch out with the chickpeas, cause they tend to go a bit mouldy.

7. They'll be ready after a few days - when they look long enough to be tasty.
I guess you're probably supposed to cut the sprout part off from the main body of the lentil or pea, but the Puy lentils were pretty tasty attached to the sprout, so I left them on.

8. Eat the yummy sprouts on a salad, sandwich or whatever...