The In and Out of Sprouts

Sprouts are lovely, lovely things.

In a mood to grow something during an unusually dark, overcast day, I started the only suitable thing in our pantry at the time. Lentils. The kids certainly raised their eyebrows at me, but were willing to try some. (okay, O.N.E.) Their verdict? One liked them enough to have again, one didn't go near the kitchen for days.

I finally ventured out recently to hunt and gather more suitable seed-sprouting choices and came back with a good supply of five seeds I think my family will like.

We now have yellow mustard seeds, alfalfa seeds, mung beans, broccoli seeds, and red clover seeds. Bring it on!

And as for my kids' willingness to try new foods? This started a couple years ago when we were part of a cooking/geography co-op group.

One month, the selected country was Japan and in one of the cookbooks we were using it stated the belief that the Japanese have that for every new food they eat, they add six days to their life.

Now every time they try something new, they yell, "There's six more days!"