Saturday, March 24, 2012

Alfalfa Sprouts ~ My 1st attempt ~

I used a little plastic box with tiny holes in the bottom, a lid, and a divider.  It is called Sprout Master and I don't have the bottom piece, so I put it into a Tupperware container as it sat on the counter.
With no instructions on "how to sprout"... I just took 2 even tablespoons of alfalfa seeds and sprinkled them into the sprouter.  I ran water over them, put the lid on, sat in down in the Tupperware container and left it on the counter.


It looked like this the first day


Hard to photograph, they started showing little bits of white

Ok, now the alfalfa looked like it was growing worms...
 I looked at it in the morning and evening and if it was looking "dry", I ran some water over it and then put it back in the container.  Some seeds fell through the holes, so I poured them back in.
 A few days later they are really starting to show some promise.
 Here I'm wondering if we should be eating them... but we leave them another day...

This is within 1 week and they are PACKED in there!
They tasted great!  They were packed tightly so I guess I don't need a full 2 tbsp full of seeds.  We ate a bunch and had them sitting on the table to munch on.  Then we forgot and didn't put them in the fridge... so some were starting to grow some other white fuzzy stuff (yuck) so we gave them to the chickens and they did NOT mind it at all.

Thrifty note:  I paid $13.30 for 1 kg of seeds.  I used 2 tbsp of that to make what looks like 4 of those little containers in the store.  Here they sell for $2-$4 per container.  So by sprouting my own 2 times, the seeds have more than paid for themselves!

Now, that said, I just read somewhere that they are not good for you... anyone else hear this?  I realize that the more books I read, the more I won't know what is true and what is false... but... just wondering...

2 comments:

Cathy said...

I've always thought they were good for you...? I used to buy them for in sandwiches all the time. This looks WAY more affordable! Also, broccoli sprouts are supposed to be really good for you.

Kathy said...

This is such a good idea because our kids have been begging to grow something, anything! I hadn't ever heard they weren't good for you.

And I quite enjoyed reading your posts about your house endeavour. We haven't had to sell our first house yet; keeping it as a rental with awesome renters. Because though I haven't lived there in 5 years, I'm not ready for the emotions of letting her go!