Sprouting With Kids


Happy New Year everyone! This post will provide you with a fun new project to jumpstart your healthy New Year resolutions :-)

A fun idea to try with your kids that I have been attempting with Kaden, is to grow SPROUTS. This is a great activity for Spring, although sprouts can be grown any time of year. Kids will love watching the little sprouts start to grow and then be able to eat them. This also may encourage fussy eaters to try a very nutritious treat.

Sprouts are a very nutrient dense food which provides an abundance of vitamins, minerals, enzymes, and protiens. Since they are a living food (such as breastmilk, yogurt, etc.), they continue to gain more nutritient qualities even after they are harvested. This does not occur with food that 'die' after they are picked such as fruits and vegetables.  This 'living' factor also contributes to a more easily digestable food source. That is why breastmilk is easy for babies to digest and yogurt is often touted as a food that is excellent for digestion (we'va all seen the TV ads for that 'active' yogurt!).  Sprouting at home is an easy and frugal way to produce an excellent nutritional food source.


You can sprout many many things from nuts to beans (dried), just make sure that they are not too old or they wont sprout. This can be done inside using very simple materials and only requires you to rinse twice a day. Also, since kids can be impatient, sprouting is great for them because you will yield results in a couple of days and the sprouts should be ready in 3-4 days or longer, depending on the kind of sprouts.

The steps for sprouting can be found at these websites:

http://www.cityfarmer.org/sprout86.html
http://www.littleakiko.com/recipes/Sprouts.php




There are many ways you can use your sprouts in recipes. However, I realize that sprouts may not entice your children since they have a funny texture and acquired taste, but maybe, just maybe, they will try them if they helped grow them. Even if they don't eat them, this project can help teach children about plant growth and beginning to garden, as well as the responsibility of remembering to water them.
Try these links for recipes using sprouts once you have your harvest:


Sprout People
Canadian Living Sprout Recipes

Good Luck Sprouting!

The previous post has been adapted from "Sprouting with Kids" written by me in 2008 on my old blog "Generation Global" on Fredmoms.com

1 comments:

  1. Great to see someone else who loves sprouting! :)

    Love your sprouter btw! we just use a mason jar...