How Many Sprouts Should I Grow?
As the Greenhouse Manager I am often asked this question from guests who would like to remain on the Hippocrates program once they return home. The answer depends largely on what the rest of your diet looks like. For optimal health, I would recommend that you strive to make your diet 50% sprouts and 50% vegetables. If you do not have a specific health challenge that you would like to address, you can make your diet 50% sprouts, 35% vegetables, and up to 15% fruit (as an option.) If you eat this way the average person will need about four cups of sprouts per day. That is, two cups for lunch and two cups for dinner.
I recommend that you grow a variety of different sprouts. Every sprout mines different nutrients as it grows. By having a variety of different sprouts in your diet you will have a complete balanced nutritional profile. One tablespoon each of perhaps, eight to ten different sprouts will add up to about two cups.
Some types of sprouts are grown just for eating and some for juicing and some for both. Sprouts for eating include adzuki, mung beans, lentils, fenugreek, garbanzo, alfalfa, clover, broccoli, radish, onion, beet, garlic, cabbage, and buckwheat. Sprouts for juicing and eating include sunflower and pea. Wheatgrass is grown only for juicing. This is because humans do not have the digestive enzymes necessary to liquefy the strong blades of grass.
Eating
For eating, you will want to grow enough sprouts to produce about four cups of sprouts per day (for the average person.) The chart below will outline the suggested growing schedule for 10 different sprouts for eating:
Sprout Start Soaking Seeds(Dry Volume) New CropFrequency Time toHarvest Finished Sprout Yield(Sprouted Volume)
Adzuki ½ cup once every three days 3 days 2 cups
Mung beans ½ cup once every three days 3 days 2 cups
Green lentils ½ cup once every three days 3 days 2 cups
Red lentils ½ cup once every three days 3 days 2 cups
Fenugreek ½ cup once every three days 3 days 2 cups
Alfalfa 2 Tablespoons once every three days 7 days 2 cups
Broccoli 2 Tablespoons once every three days 7 days 2 cups
Radish 2 Tablespoons once every three days 7 days 2 cups
Sunflower 1 cup once every seven days 12 days one 10” X 10” tray
Pea Shoots 1 cup once every seven days 7 days one 10” X 10” tray
Juicing
For juicing, you will want to grow enough sprouts to produce 2-two ounce shots of wheatgrass juice every day and 2-sixteen ounce green drinks every day (per person.) The chart below will outline the suggested growing schedule for 3 different sprouts for juicing. This is in addition to the sprouts that you are growing for eating:
Sprout Start Soaking Seeds(Dry Volume) New CropFrequency Time toHarvest Finished Sprout Yield(Sprouted Volume)
Wheatgrass 1 cup once every two days 7 days one 10” X 10” tray
Sunflower 1 cup once every two days 12 days one 10” X 10” tray
Pea Shoots 1 cup once every two days 7 days one 10” X 10” tray
Supplies
It only takes about two square feet of kitchen countertop space to grow five pounds of food every week in the form of sprouts when growing in Mason jars. You will need 16 Mason jars all lined up in a drain pan on the kitchen counter or on a bamboo dish drying rack with each one growing a different type of sprout. In order to maintain this program you will need the following supplies (per person):
- 16 - Mason jars with sprout lids (or EasySprouters)
- 3 – 16” X 22” Tupperware lids (to use as drain pans)
- 2 – Hydrosol racks (small)
- 20 – 10” X 10” trays
- Adzuki bean seeds (2.5 pounds per month)
- Mung bean seeds (2.5 pounds per month)
- Green lentil seeds (2.5 pounds per month)
- Red lentil seeds (2.5 pounds per month)
- Fenugreek seeds (2.5 pounds per month)
- Alfalfa seeds (12 ounces per month)
- Broccoli seeds (12 ounces per month)
- Radish seeds (12 ounces per month)
- Wheatgrass seeds (5 pounds per month)
- Pea shoot seeds (6 pounds per month)
- Sunflower seeds (4.5 pounds per month)
Article by Brian Hetrich Greenhouse Manager
