Day 55: Sprouts

Houston, we have sprouts.

I harvested my first batch of sprouts today! It's really amazing how quickly they go from seed to fully grown and ready to be eaten. As seen on the left are my clover sprouts in the half-gallon jar, pre-hulling, and my lentil sprouts in the quart jar, dried in the salad spinner and ready for storage (no hulling reqired). They didn't make it that far though. We ate them with dinner. And I have my eye on the clover for a smoothie in the morning.

The growing process was relatively painless. I rinsed three times a day, in the morning, when I got home from school and before bed. I never did get around to covering them with a towel per Becki's suggestion, but they were really only in indirect sunlight for part of the day in that corner of my kitchen. I placed the clover in the window to develop some chlorophyll on the last day, and I think it greened nicely.

I'm ready to place an order for more seeds online from Sprout People, but I'm having trouble making up my mind. I made a list of everything I wanted, and the total was exorbitant. It's their blends that get me. The combinations all sound so good. Madeline's going to have to help me narrow it down.

I took the pictures in my currently (but temporarily) defunct balcony container garden, and look what I discovered! I had no idea that chives were annuals, but apparently they can go 2-3 years without being resown. After that, they start to lose their flavor. I took a small taste test of these, and they're definitely chivy. I can't wait for my local nursery to open in a couple weeks so I can get the rest of my garden going. This year I'm thinking plenty of tomato plants and copious amounts of parsley and basil. Focusing on just a few varieties of plants is probably a good idea so that we'll yield a significant quantity in our limited space. We'll see how that goes once I actually get there and am confronted by the numerous choices.

I did get to go on my hike, and it was even better than I thought it would be. I was actually really tired and dragging my heels when I got out of work, but I'm glad that I pushed myself to get out there. I have never once regretted a hike once I'm actually doing it, no matter how reluctant I was in the first place.

I trekked one of my regular trails and then decided to explore a new one. I was enjoying it, but it seems like it's also one of the more popular trails with the mountain bikers. I normally encounter a few, but after a while, I was jumping off the trail so frequently it was starting to get ridiculous. I felt like the original Super Mario hopping over those incessant rolling balls... know which level I'm talking about? I think I'll avoid that trail for a while, at least on a Friday at that time of day.

-Eloise

Day 52

Exhibit A to the left shows a small corner of my (small) kitchen two days ago. Since going raw, we'd removed the toaster and the waffle maker from the living room, but the microwave has just sat there, taking up room. It did make a pretty good fruit platform, but I think it was a bit over-qualified for the job.

I've been reading a lot about sprouting. I had fun gardening on our balcony last summer (even after the stink bugs ate most of my vegetables), and I'm always down for some instant gratification, so it seemed like the best of both worlds. I purchased The Sprouting Book by Ann Wigmore, which is a great resource if you're considering getting started.

Getting set up was a bit of a process that's taken me the better part of a month. I decided that the jar method would be the most economical, and Ace Hardware had the best prices on mason jars. They deliver free to the store as well, which seems beneficial on all levels when you're talking about mailing a metric ton of glass. I got a case of pints, a case of quarts and a case of half gallons. Although I'm using the half gallons to sprout (per Ann Wigmore's specifications) I've come up with a dozen different ways to use the other sizes. I may have to order more in the near future.

I also purchased these mesh lids from Sprout People. Cheese cloth would work as well, but this seemed like it would make the job a bit easier. A dish drying rack from Target later, and my hardware was complete.

As for the sprouting seeds themselves, I will eventually purchase them online in bulk. In the meantime, however, my local-ish health food store has them in stock. I picked up clover, lentils and red wheat to start. Although it was more expensive this way, I wanted to make sure that I would stick with it before committing to a pound plus of seeds.

So far so good. As you can see, the microwave is gone and lovely sprouts are growing in its place. I have room for six sprouting jars eventually, but I figured that two was enough to get started in the event of major catastrophe. I still need to figure out what to do with our appliances. There had been a small fire (very small, really) in our toaster (though we kept using it....), so throwing it out was really the only thing that could be done at that point, but the microwave, waffle iron and crock pot are still perfectly serviceable. I think I may post them to Craigslist and see if anyone's willing to purchase them.

Sprouting is very satisfying. It's been a day and an half, and I've begun to see little sprouty tails. As for the fruit, it's found a new home. I dragged a desk into the kitchen that we hadn't been using, and surprisingly it fit. It will be great for when the dehydrator gets here (on Thursday!!), because I wasn't really sure where that was going to go.

The cats approve:

Ruth, Naomi, Fred and Ethel

-Eloise