Anyone grow sprouts?

I've been looking at that site for months thinking about sprouting, now that I hear so much positive about them I think I'll go to Sprout People and order something.
Thanks

Anyone still sprouting? I must confess, ever since I came across this topic on the forum, I've grown sprouts on a weekly basis
Some of my favorites:
Broccoli
Radish
Sunflower

How are you sprouting your sunflower? I have a jar sprouter and the seeds, not hulled. I thought they needed to be done in a tray? Sunflower greens are sooooooo delish! I buy them at the farmers market all the time.

I buy them hulled, raw, and grow them in a jar just like other sprout.

Sprouting, sprouting. Who's still sprouting ? I still eat my own sprouts just about everyday. I love my sprouts! Found some great mixes for something a little different at a local vitamin store, and a lid. I still prefer my homemade screens.



Sprouts, sprouts! Grow your own sprouts

Screens? Like this?


Not only have I used this method to sprout SFG seeds, I actually planted some of my health store pea & broccoli sprouts this year into the SFG. Both are doing very well. I actually did that with the same broccoli sprouts last fall but they didn't head up - not enuff time I think. They are miles ahead now than they ever got last fall. But if they don't head up at least I can eat the leaves.

Your mix look yummy! I sometimes like to mix a half tsp of radish seeds in with other seeds to spice them up a bit.

CC

MMM, yes! Radish are one of my favs...and broccoli



This is how I made my own screens:
http://www.kitchen-counter-gardening.com/equipment/making-a-sprouting-jar/

I used my wifes splatter guard I've never heard a word about it

I started a few jar of sunflower seed for the first time amd have jsut tasted a couple of them for the first time. I assume you dom't eat the seed hulls as they are so tough? I picked through my first jar and picked off allthe hulls. I bought a large bag of the seed for about $5.00.

Huh. That lid is very interesting, Rooster. I was taught (by my mother) to turn the jar slightly slanted but upside down in the sink after each rinsing so that all the water will drip out. Do you lids allow that? And if not, apparently it doesn't matter coz your spouts look beautiful!

So far I've always eaten the hulls. Never thought not to...

Did anyone else ever plant their sprouts? If so, what happened?

CC

Thanks for bumping this thread today! Been thinking about starting sprouting for a while, now - this cinches it! Can't wait to start!

CapeCoddess wrote:Huh. That lid is very interesting, Rooster. I was taught (by my mother) to turn the jar slightly slanted but upside down in the sink after each rinsing so that all the water will drip out. Do you lids allow that? And if not, apparently it doesn't matter coz your spouts look beautiful!

So far I've always eaten the hulls. Never thought not to...

Did anyone else ever plant their sprouts? If so, what happened?

CC

I do turn my jars upside down at a slant. You want to get all the moisture out after each rinsing or the sprouts will be slimy. My homemade screen lids work better for this. You press on the screen with a finger will shaking upside down to get rid of most of the water.
I haven't planted these sprouts. I eat em

RoOsTeR wrote:

CapeCoddess wrote:Huh. That lid is very interesting, Rooster. I was taught (by my mother) to turn the jar slightly slanted but upside down in the sink after each rinsing so that all the water will drip out. Do you lids allow that? And if not, apparently it doesn't matter coz your spouts look beautiful!

So far I've always eaten the hulls. Never thought not to...

Did anyone else ever plant their sprouts? If so, what happened?

CC

I do turn my jars upside down at a slant. You want to get all the moisture out after each rinsing or the sprouts will be slimy. My homemade screen lids work better for this. You press on the screen with a finger will shaking upside down to get rid of most of the water.
I haven't planted these sprouts. I eat em

So that is why my expensive gourmet sprouts turn all slimy.
My cheap sunflowers are doing great. I have also planted the sunflowers very thickly in my SFG to see what happens there.

I love sprouts, especially in winter when I crave really fresh, nutrient dense food and the garden is under snow! I use pint canning jars with cheesecloth inserted under the ring. I tried a stacked sprouter but ended up giving it away, mostly cuz it was hard to get really clean between batches. With my canning jars, that's never a problem.

If you have very little sunlight indoors, you can sprout anywhere such as the back of your kitchen counter, and just move your jar to a bright window for the last half day or so to green up. Doesn't even have to be a southern window, so long as it's bright your sprouts will green up.

My favorite source is Johnny's Seeds in Maine johnnyseeds.com and their seeds are listed under Vegetables>Shoots and Vegetables>Sprouts. For those who find sprouting seeds expensive compared to their plain ol' garden seed equivalents, the difference is that seeds specifically sold for sprouting are tested to be free of nasties such as e.coli. The small extra expense is worth it to me!

When I had my homestead, in winter I kept several plastic window boxes inside on the window sill to grow shoots for my ducks and chickens. They were just as grateful as we humans for some fresh greens during the long dark winter. A couple of their favorites were buckwheat and sunflowers. They also got sprouts--nothing like a batch of wheat sprouts floating in a pan of tepid water on a frigid January day to give the ducks some major winter pleasure! My girls' eggs had rich golden yokes all winter.

I'm talking about growing for a small homestead's flocks, but check this out: farm scale sprouting for livestock! http://www.foddersystems.com/index.html. Those are some lucky farm animals to get fresh greens when pasture is not available!

And my sprouts for the week are ready

This time last week:


And now:


Yum!

i was thinking of growing my own sprouting seed so i was wondering if anny of you have done this? and what are your experance.

im thinking broccli  mung been buckwheat

 so far im still testing this sample sprout pack to decide what i like

I haven't done it but I should, we love sprouts on our salads and it seems to simple to do it your self rather than buy them at the store. Let me know what your favorite ends up being!

I've grown alfalfa, broccoli, and mung, and enjoy them all.  Last year  I tried growing them on a tray, rather than in a jar, to get a greater volume per batch.  But I guess I haven't found the right technique yet.  The trays required more attention and frequent daily spritzing to keep them at just the right amount of dampness.

Ok, I'm confused, are we talking about growing sprouts for consumption or growing plants for the seeds?

I find keeping a lid on them makes a huge difference. They like it warm and humid and dark and don't care for breezes. I love growing sprouts. So healthy and crunchy! I especially like broccoli sprouts (the tastiest IMO), radish sprouts (the easiest and nice and spicy!) and mung bean (they don't keep well but are fantastic sauteed or steamed and then mixed with other vegetables, and good on sandwiches too). I've used several kinds of store-bought sprouting tray set-ups, and made my own perforated dishes to grow sprouts in, too.

Yup, I sprout:
These are mung & radish.  I just finished off a jar of pea shoots.  My faves are broccoli & radish mixed.  Or anything and radish mixed.  I use a piece of screen with a rubber band for the tops.

It takes much longer, a week to 10 days, to grow them this time of year as the house temp is between 58 & 64.    It's faster, about 3 days depending on what's being sprouted, when it's warmer. 

CC

Mark, do you want to explain how you sprout something. Just for general info. The photo shows the tools: glass jar, screening material (I'm assuming cheese cloth it also okay?), and a rubber band!!

camprn wrote:Ok, I'm confused, are we talking about growing sprouts for consumption or growing plants for the seeds?

Now that you mention it...I'm not sure either!   

sanderson wrote:Mark, do you want to explain how you sprout something. Just for general info. The photo shows the tools: glass jar, screening material (I'm assuming cheese cloth it also okay?), and a rubber band!!

sanderson, that photo wasn't mine; it was Capecodess's. But what she's doing there is probably the most common and traditional way of sprouting. You put the seeds into a jar and usually lay the jar sideways. They even sell special "sprouting jars" for that. You can cover the mouth with a piece of cloth or paper towel, and after pouring some water into the jar, you use the cloth/paper to strain the water out, leaving the seeds behind. Another traditional way to do it is to use hemp bags. I haven't used either of those methods, so I'll leave it to Capecoddess or others experienced in it to mention any fine points.

The basics for sprouting are that you water the sprouts multiple times a day over a period of usually 3 to 5 days, if temperatures are warm enough (longer if colder), until you get the seeds to sprout. Then you rinse the seed hulls off (a lettuce spinner is great for that) and eat the sprouts left behind.

They don't need light (seeds usually sprout underground), so you don't have to worry about that and can grow them anywhere, even under the sink. Only for a very few types of sprouts, like sunflowers, is soil recommended. Either way, you don't need fertilizer or any of the normal things you think growing plants need, besides water and drainage and warmth, and maybe a bit of humidity. Some sprouts benefit from "greening." That's when you put them in the sun for a few hours to get them to produce chlorophyll in their little seed leaves.

To grow my sprouts, I've used stacking round containers that I found on Amazon. They work extremely well but are not ideal for tall sprouts like mung beans because each stacking level of the container is fairly short. I've also used various square plastic trays with perforated bottoms, but found it impossible to get the sprouts out of the trays without slicing them off at the bottom, as they grew through the perforations, which were just too large. That could lose me a third or more of the sprouts sometimes.

I also got some cheap tupperware-type plastic containers at the dollar store and punched their bottoms full of tiny holes to let water through like a slow sieve, and put them inside of other tupperware containers about the same size, as if stacking bowls two at a time. The top one with the holes got the seeds and got the water put into it, which drained into the bottom one. The bottom one got emptied if too full, but usually I keep some of the drained water in there to insulate the container and keep it warmer and more humid. I put the lids on top for the first few days, to increase the humidity too. The "make it yourself" deal is a very cheap and easy way to do it. It does tend to produce curled sprouts, as they get sloshed around when you put the water in. I suppose you could just spritz the seeds instead of watering them, but you'd have to spritz an awful lot. Sprouts like water, and if you let them dry out you can easily lose them.

Sometimes the sprouts start to look furry, as if they got attacked by fungus. Actually it's just a lot of fine root hairs.

That's the basics of it. I got a great sprout book I could recommend. I'll find it; it has recipes and precise information on many types of sprout, including pre-soak times and temperatures, which makes a huge difference.

Thank you, Marc. I have seen the stacking trays on ebay and thought about doing sprouts. They are good on sandwiches in lieu of lettuce.

See if I have this right using a design like CC's with the horizontal covered jars. Put in seeds, cover and secure with band, add water, turn upside down to drain. Repeat adding water and draining a few times a day. I sure hope 2x day will do.

soak the seeds overnight first then do as for they say

 they sell lid kits that has different lids with different hole sise you want good air circulation in there also they sell a stand to set the jar at an angle to let the excess waste drain 

i have that tray method and i used to use  a home made method where i drilled 4 small holes in each corner of a glad container then had a bucket under them then had a timer turn on a pump to water the top tray i useto use this for wheat grass with a little sunflower sprouts in there for the chickens
books on the subject here
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B003AM738W/ref=oh_d__o09_details_o09__i01?ie=UTF8&psc=1
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0037CFA7G/ref=oh_d__o01_details_o01__i00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
i ben wanting to try the bamboo basket method it sounds good

oh and by the way i was talking about growing plants for the purpose of collecting the seed for sprouting