We grew & taste-tested 3 kinds of sprouts! 1- lentils, 2- broccoli seeds, and 3- mung beans. Curious how they turned out? Here’s our review!
1. SPROUTED LENTILS
- Taste: Sweet, peppery.
- Texture: Crispy, crunchy.
- Nutrition: High protein, high folate.
Final opinion: Our favorite sprout! These were slightly sweet and oh-so-crunchy! They were tasty on everything we tried– salads, sandwiches, grain bowls, hummus toast, and our favorite, chickpea/avocado salad. Mouthwatering! Because most grocery stores stock dried lentils, these are easy to make anytime. We tried harvesting them on days 2, 3, & 4, and they were great each time, with no day clearly outperforming the others, so it just depends how large you want them… and how patiently you can wait before gobbling them up! We could eat these all day, every day. (And for only $0.12 per serving, why not?!)
2. SPROUTED BROCCOLI SEEDS
- Taste: Sulfur-y.
- Texture: Soft, grassy.
- Nutrition: High sulforaphane, high vitamin C.
- Final opinion: We tried these primarily for their sulforaphane, a potent health booster. They were fine, but now we see why they’re less popular than other sprouts. (Even so-called “sulforaphane mixes” combine broccoli sprouts with other, tastier sprouts. Maybe a spoonful of clover helps the broccoli go down?) These weren’t as spicy as radish sprouts, or as sweet as alfalfa sprouts, but they had a similar texture. Their grassy mouthfeel would make them a great choice for haystack salads. However, they’re hard to find in stores, and they have a teeny bit of a rotting-egg smell, so we wouldn’t recommend them to picky eaters. Health nuts though? Definitely– they are nutritional powerhouses!
3. SPROUTED MUNG (MOONG) BEANS
- Taste: Mildly sweet, earthy.
- Texture: Bursting with water.
- Nutrition: Low calorie yet high folate.
- Final opinion: Sure, they’re mostly water, but no bowl of pho would be complete without these babies! (Sidenote: If you haven’t tried pho yet, are you even living? We prefer the veggie version with a walloping dose of chili oil!) These took a couple extra days to reach their ideal size, but they were worth the wait! They added a satisfying crunch to meals without imparting much flavor of their own, which made them quite versatile. They also held up great in soups without getting soggy. They weren’t the bright, white sprouts we were expecting though. Apparently, some restaurants blanch their sprouts, and that gives them their pristine appearance! But that’s probably a good thing, since commercially prepared sprouts are frequently linked to food poisoning. (Pregnant people: Beware!) Luckily, you don’t have to worry so much about improperly grown or handled sprouts when you make them at home!
Have you tried sprouting? Let us know how it turned out! What should we try sprouting next??