Have a high level of sulforaphane, supposedly useful for combating insulin resistance, visceral fats, inflammations and a load of other things. Not certain about any of that.
But they also just taste really good.
However, sprouts, and to a lesser extent microgreens, are also one of the food groups that while available for purchase in most supermarkets nowadays, really really should not be bought unless you are very certain you know how to determine whether there is anything wrong with them, and also have a very good nose, since they are extremely easily contaminated with severely harmful microorganisms. (If smell is off in Any Way, do not eat!)
Sprouts are worse on the contamination-ease scale than microgreens, so I chose the latter method to start the domestic experiments. (Sprouts - you germinate the seeds washing and mixing the whole thing constantly, the tiny "plant" has no way to grow properly, so you end up eating the whole thing with root, shoot, left-over seed shells. Microgreens - germinate the seeds on flat surface, water without moving the sprouted plantlets so they grow normally upwards and the shoots can be cut and eaten without the root, therefore avoiding the tissues that have been constantly wet and thus have a higher probability of being "off". Smell!!)
Need a growing setup of some sort of perforated tray that fits on top of a waterproof undertray. Plastics, silicones, metal, glass, combined ones available commercially in various shapes and sizes, can also improvise with whatever you happen to have at home. I went with commercial stainless steel trays due to suitable size and ability to heat-sterilise them in an oven.
3 types of seeds from Amazon as a test - 2 originating from Italy with some sort of organic labelling, 1 from the states I think (already discarded all the packs, can't be bothered to go check right now). Main restriction is to avoid seeds sprayed with any sort of fertilisers or pesticides meant for single-sowing and growing into large broccoli plants in soil. Besides that, the seeds for sprouts are the exact same used for microgreens are the exact same used for the garden broccoli, so don't get cheated by all the "microgreen seeds" labelling.
Trial-and-error so far:
- Plastic tupperware boxes with wet kitchen towel inside, lid open in the corner, set onto kitchen counter, no sterilisation of anything. Have successfully used this method in the past for sprouting micro-radishes. Did not work at all for brokkoli. Watering disturbed the sprouts so the plants ended up being somewhere between the micro and the sprout stage, all messed up, some attached to the tissue, some not, impossible to sort out for eating. One of the three boxes (one type of seeds, the US one) also developed distinctly contaminated smell - straight to trash. Out of other two boxes, got about 5 shoots to taste.
- Metal tray stack, sterilised in an oven for 10 minutes, max heat. Italian seeds pre-soaked for half a day, spread thinly directly on the perforated metal (after cooling, of course), no "substrate" imitation used. Bottom tray filled with normal water and that water changed every day. Second full metal tray set upside down on top to lessen evaporation and give seedlings the dark-signal to germinate. Here onwards everything on small table under a half-way UV-blocking window, since that's the lightest we can go. Room temperature (right now swinging between 15 and 30 degrees). Did not work either. Seeds did germinate, even if they were rolling around the tray every time I moved anything, about a third of them actually formed shoots, but even those did not push roots down into the water reservoir and therefore dried out as soon as I took the top cover off to let them green up. Got maybe ten-fifteen shoots out of this batch.
- Metal trays, sterilised in the oven max temp 20 minutes, let cool. Second type of Italian seeds, half of tray covered with regular thick not-easily breakable paper kitchen towel, other half with the special fish-drying cloth-paper commonly used in Japan in both commerce and at home. Seeds rinsed with regular water before sowing sparsely. All water used from here onwards: filtered tap water, boiled, put into large metal bottle to cool overnight and used the following day. Tissues moistened every couple of days carefully from the edge so as not to disturb the sprouts. Water in bottom tray also changed every couple of days. Seeds grew proper roots straight through the "fish paper" into the water, and worked out properly. The kitchen towel side had zero root growth through it, so all seedlings failed once the cover was off. Amount of sprouts gotten - one meal's worth.
- Metal trays sterilised in oven, all water filtered, boiled, cooled. Half toilet paper, half normal thin and breakable "facial" (nose-blowing) tissue. US seeds, densely sown. Tissues moistened and bottom water changed every couple of days. Cover on for about 3 days, then another 3 in light. Worked like miracle. From the looks of it nearly all seeds germinated, enough microgreens for about 8 meals.
- Sterilise trays and boil water.
- Use a layer of clean facial tissue as substrate on perforated tray.
- Seeds matter - continuing tests with various ones from different sources.
- Sow seeds densely, they physically support eachother while growing and also lessen evaporation from the surface.
- Leave space to the edges of the tray/tissue to add water and cover the top whilst in the "dark" period.
- Change bottom water every second day (also rinse the tray with boiling water while at it).
- When shoots 4cm tall, remove cover and give as much light as possible.
- Edible in about a week from the start of process, after greening can keep on tray for another week.
Cheers,
Hedi
