Have you ever eaten bean sprouts on a salad or in a sandwich?  They add a lot of texture to a dish, and tons of super nutrition!  Sprouts are very young beans, and they are very nutrient dense.  Did you know you can sprout beans at home?  It’s a very simple process and super easy to get kids involved.  They’ll love watching seeds sprout into beans (without stems, leaves and soil) which they then get to eat!  There are a lot of different sprouting methods, but this is the one we use at the barn because it works and it’s super easy.

Time: A few minutes a day for 5 days.

Materials: ¼ to ½ cup of dried beans (mung beans are commonly used because they’re easy to sprout, or other beans/lentils will work too), water, an empty jar.

Adult prep: Find a suitable wide-mouthed jar (like a recycled jelly jar, big enough that there’s room for the beans to sprout and expand) with a lid.

Kids’ Activity:

Day 1: Rinse 1/4 to 1/2 cup of dried beans and then place rinsed beans in jar.  Fill the jar with water to cover the beans, and cover the jar.  Make sure it’s kept at room temperature.

Day 2: Empty the water and lay the jar sideways, let the beans spread out.

Day 3: Fill the jar with water and swish the water around to rinse the beans gently.  Empty the water, and put the jar on its side again.

Day 4: Repeat Day 3 activities.

Day 5: The beans should be sprouting!  Eat them plain or put them in salads and sandwiches, and enjoy this delicious source of fiber, protein, essential fatty acids, and vitamins A, E & C plus the B vitamins.

 

– Stacey Antine, MS RD, author, Appetite for Life and founder, HealthBarn USA

A healthy lifestyle isn’t all about food: keeping kids active and fostering their creativity is essential for healthy development, too!  In this blog, I’ll be sharing weekly activity ideas for families to do together.