Grow Your Own... Beansprouts

Intro: Grow Your Own... Beansprouts

This is the 2nd in my grow your own food series - this deals with the art of sprouting. Yes you can rush out and buy an expensive sprouting kit - or use my technique of recycling materials to grow your own!

It is debatable whether you are saving 'food' miles on this product as you'll need mung beans which'll have come from some far off distance place - but at least you're not importing a finished product which is filled with water rather than a compact seed - it's also a fraction of the price.

You'll need:

1) a container of some sorts - I use a 'butter' spread container
2) a pointy thing
3) mung beans
4) plenty of water

If you want the same thing go check out this instructable (he did it first!): https://www.instructables.com/id/STGACNIF7DWQXQF/

STEP 1: Take Your Yogurt Pot

Go find a suitable container - you could use anything really you don't mind shoving holes in - preferably something that is food safe. You'll be fairly ok with anything that has had food in it.

STEP 2: Stab!

Yes, take your frustrations out on your pot - if you've got something that isn't wafer thin take more care - if you have an open top container you could use cling film (though not very ecofriendly) but you'll need to do step 3 before you cover it over and stab the top.

STEP 3: Beans Lots of Beans...

The first image is of mung beans - these are the beans available at any health food store for the nominal sum of 59p (or similar) - in other countries I have no idea, but it should be cheaper as Britain is a rip off...

Pour some beans into your pot - you'll need to experiment to how many you need for a decent stir fry.

STEP 4: Soak

Soak the beans initially over night in plenty of water. After this you'll only need to rinse the beans twice a day (three if you can manage it) until they are of a tasty size. See the next step for draining instructions!

STEP 5: Drain

Because of the clever holes you've made in the top of your container, just turn it upside down (though note it can be a good idea to rest it at an angle so it drains better) - no mess and dead quick to do when you're out the door to work/school etc.

STEP 6: Refrigerate

4-7 days later

They're done. You can either stick this box straight into the refrigerator or alternatively just dump them into another container and start over - a quick turn around of these means you'll always have a source of sprouts for the next stir fry.

You won't get them really fat without using pressure on the sprouts, but I think these work just fine - taste good in sandwiches, salads or stir fries.

Comments

[awang8]

I used to do this, but when I bought some store-bought ones (I was tired and hungry and couldn't be stuffed waiting a few days) and ate them I thought they tasted better. Still, nice tutorial. It's really good for a budget, because store-bought mung bean sprouts are really expensive. PS: You should add that it's possible to plant these sprouts and turn them into bean plants.

[headphoned]

I'm trying this method at the moment and it works well, but I would mention that it needs to be kept in a relatively warm location. We keep our house cold ~60 F and the sprouts were taking ages on the counter top. We put our's near a radiator and it helped wonders -- on top of a fridge might also be a good location in a cold house. Anyway, this is really fun, cheap and easy! Do it!

[bobise]

I love how the container you picked says "Flora".