spk_1:   0:00
Good day, Good people.

spk_0:   0:02
Good day, Good day. And welcome to the show The Big Show, the most important and critically acclaimed podcast that is recorded in our car. And today we're in the red Studio editor. I haven't across the great, beautiful state of Iowa, where surrounded by Iowa corn fuels, which in the middle of winter have snow on the edges and absolutely no corn in them, anywhere to be seen. Iowa, maybe, where the tall corn grows, but not in the winter, which unfortunately means it's being winter. You cannot throw food in Iowa or where we live in north Missouri. You can't grow any food. You just can't grow any green crops at all in the winter. And that's a shame.

spk_1:   0:49
He's baiting me. He's baiting me. He knows this isn't true. She doesn't know what she sniffed it out. She sniffed it out. Yeah,

spk_0:   0:58
I just figured it out sprouting. It would be a little bit more surprising to her, had we not just yesterday going toe one of our favorite, um, alternative stores this'll

spk_1:   1:17
one Mennonite run

spk_0:   1:18
yeah, book store and bought a bunch of sees. We're gonna grow a crop in the winter I look in that being

spk_1:   1:32
sprouting now two things here. One. We're not talking about giant volumes of food, and the food you get is not high calorie stuff. We're not talking about food to sustain your caloric needs. We're talking about. If it's in the middle of winter and you're trying to live off that stored stuff from the shells, chili and 55 varieties blah, blah, blah. You can be extremely comforted by the president's presence of something fresh and green and frankly, also bursting with vitamins and minerals. It's very nutritious stuff, organically grown. What it is. Well, sure, it's naturally, organically grown. There's no point in applying either fertilizer or pesticides to sprout. The basic idea here is sprouting seeds for things that send up lots of little shoots. They're tasty and eating little shoots while they're still tiny little guys with their very first leaves coming out. Kotal, Eden's If we want to go all science talk on

spk_0:   2:40
it now here's the Here's the funky thing about sprouts is there's all kinds of different spots. But some of these routes are for, uh, types of plants you would not eat otherwise, like alfalfa is one of our favorites,

spk_1:   2:55
so I love alfalfa sprouts,

spk_0:   2:56
but you wouldn't eat. You wouldn't eat a field of alfalfa grass.

spk_1:   3:00
We can't get calories from the growing alfalfa plants because most of the calories are in a type of carbohydrate. We can't break down, so you feed it to grazing animals. And then, if you wish, you can eat the grazing animals, but they can get calories out of it, really can. But the stuff's in the seed is another thing entirely because in that seed, but the mother plant has done there has packed everything that little bitty embryo is going to need for its first week or so of life. It's got all the minerals in there that that baby plant is gonna need to establish itself. It's got enough carbohydrate stores for the little plant to live off of until it can get itself a couple of leaves out and start doing photosynthesis to make its own. It's got a bunch of essential nutrients that are important for building important kinds of molecules that the baby plants gonna need to make a good start. Everything you need to make a good start in your first week of life has to be packed there in that little bitty tiny seed. And then the sprout is all that stuff, plus some, or that the plant makes in its first few days of life and a bunch of

spk_0:   4:14
water. And while those nutrients are all there for that plant and that's everything, it has loomed for us. They become micro nutrients. Yeah, your body. So they taste good. Don't get me wrong.

spk_1:   4:29
Micro nutrients are things you absolutely need to run your physiology well, but you only need him in very small quantities, which means you can get a useful amount of them from a handful of sprouts.

spk_0:   4:41
And frankly, there's some of those that you can't really get any other way than fresh greenies.

spk_1:   4:47
A lot of them are delicate molecules that don't preserve well.

spk_0:   4:51
And so this is your so basically, what we're talking about, it is gonna be a short little podcast because, you know, Sprouting is something that we've done for years. But it's also it's pretty simple, Yeah, of the things like that, we do it not just because Oh, this is these are great things to have in storage, in case you know, the world goes on Mad Max. We do it because

spk_1:   5:18
I'm meeting him.

spk_0:   5:19
Yeah, you go to the grocery store, you could buy sprouts at the grocery store, but you're gonna pay out the nose for

spk_1:   5:25
those air Really expensive. And there are a lot more likely to be bacteria lee contaminated than which growed home guys.

spk_0:   5:31
That's right. You want to talk about You know, we've been hearing so much in the news lately about E. Coli and bacterial contamination of food. You're not gonna get me that with these crowds because they've never been in contact with.

spk_1:   5:44
So the basic way I do this, we actually he actually needs the shopper sprung for a couple of little plastic sprouting trays, which are basically just rectangular trays with a mesh in it that is fine enoughto let water through, but not to let seeds fall through. And there's a couple of them so they can stack. And that way I can put him. I actually put him inside my dehydrator when I'm not using my dehydrated to dry things

spk_0:   6:11
way. It's a black dehydrator. Big trade. I think

spk_1:   6:20
dice art is the right name,

spk_0:   6:22
but you stick it in the stick in the dehydrated. Then you closed the cover on it and they were in the dark. They like they like the dark. Yeah,

spk_1:   6:30
and they're someplace where they won't get crushed and you take him out. The basic plan is you take just a couple tablespoons of sprouting seed in each one of these trays, and each tray is about, 09 by nine inches. Couple tablespoons of seed in there. Take the little water sprayer from the sink. If you don't have a sprayer, you can apply it other ways. It doesn't really matter. Get the things nice and wet. Then you hold the tray up in a little bit of an angle to let most of the water run out. So it's just the seeds have been damped, but they're not standing in water. That's an important consideration because the rot if they stand in the water

spk_0:   7:10
right. These trades all have have holes in the bottom. Holy enoughto the water go through, but it will not look the seeds fault or even those little tiny Apophis sees this. These these are really small. Yeah,

spk_1:   7:22
and just a couple tablespoons of seed is all you need and nine by nine You moisten them twice a day, you get the excess water are often, believe, a moist You stick him in the dark after about, uh, it depends a little bit on the sea type, but about a week they have put up these little white shoots, and they've got little the first to coddle Eden's. The first little leaves that are pre programmed by the plant that are made from the stored seeds stuff puts out those 1st 2 little leaves that come out pale and not very green. Yet you set him in the ER, where they can get some light for one day. So they start building chlorophyll and it jumps the nutrient content quite a bit and also makes them prettier and taste here, and then you're ready to meet him

spk_0:   8:10
Now. One thing that she'll do, she'll leave a note. Um, for me, she leaves generally earlier than I get up. She'll even upbringing. Please be a friend of spot or sprout

spk_1:   8:23
friend to sprouts is inviting him to water the sprouts because they're really only need to be done twice a day. But sometimes I leave pretty early in the morning and I might not be back till pretty late at night, so the sprouts could use a friend somewhere in between. They don't like to dry out entirely,

spk_0:   8:43
but you do have to kind of watch it when you go ahead and spread them. You do have to kind of knocks the water out of the bottom of train because you don't really wanna leave standing water. And even though there's holes in the bottom, you still get that that tension in the water.

spk_1:   8:58
Yeah, the water tension holds it in, so I hold the trade until and then I touch a finger to the bottom at one spot. It's like touching the underside of a tent wall where it wasn't leaking. It will immediately start running through and leaking.

spk_0:   9:10
Don't do that.

spk_1:   9:11
Don't do that. But if it's ah sprout Trey, you're trying to drain. It's a great way Thio give the water tension. The water that gets on your finger first kind of pulls the other water molecules after it, and that will run out all the excess water when it stops dripping. You just put him in easy thing to do, and I get Maur than two full packed courts of sprouts out of those two nine by nine trays and a total of four tablespoons of seed. And that's as much as we can eat in the time before it goes bad,

spk_0:   9:43
right? Not only that, if you look at the cost of that of the store

spk_1:   9:48
Oh, yeah, that's like 10 bucks worth.

spk_0:   9:51
And how much of the C 50 cents?

spk_1:   9:54
Oh, way less than six tons. Sprouting seeds is fairly expensive, but it goes a very long way because you're only using a tablespoon or two at a time for per nine by nine. Trey.

spk_0:   10:06
Okay, now you're ready for some caveats. CAVEATS Sure, sprouts are delicious and you know who also was to eat sprouts bunnies? Vice vice If you have a mouse problem which we never have had in our house until last year, we had some ice skated. Now we have now we have cats way kind of fixed her miles,

spk_1:   10:34
started inviting the feral cats to visit our pork

spk_0:   10:39
and because you know ex, then l will come in. It's a miracle we haven't added before that, but mice will eats Brown's just letting you know. So,

spk_1:   10:48
yeah, they ate all my sprouting seeds that year. I wasn't sprouting any at the time, but they do it, you know they would. You watch their little twitchy nose is what you're gonna do about that.

spk_0:   10:58
Make adjustments. Just put it in a container.

spk_1:   11:02
Yeah, another one is different. Seeds have different flavors. Things that make stronger flavored products like radishes, make it spicier sprouts. And you might like that you might not like that. Salty doesn't much. So we mostly make alfalfa sprouts is what goes on top of his chili and things like that

spk_0:   11:27
a good thing if you have a really picky eater and I could be really picky, but you could take these sprouts and just Sprinkle him into the chili or whatever else you've got, and the person will never even know they're there.

spk_1:   11:41
Yeah, they

spk_0:   11:42
have a strong willed

spk_1:   11:43
down so fast when they're well, they're always fresh. They wilt down so fast when you put him in something hot that they're textures and bothersome and very mild taste. If you pick the mild things like alfalfa

spk_0:   11:59
and especially if you're putting in something with a strong taste, like a chili or something like that, and you could get a lot of green goodness into a dish that a picky eater will still eat because they don't realize they're there. They do it just Oh yeah,

spk_1:   12:17
yeah. People with other kinds of tastes often appreciate the color and texture change of sprinkling fresh sprouts on top of a bowl of super chili or pasta dish or something like that. A green accent on top. It gives a little bit of a crunch. It's got a little bit of a temperature difference because it's hot food and you just put some cool sprouts on top. And ah, lot of people find that makes stored food much more appealing because it has a much fresher taste and look to it if you had the sprouts.

spk_0:   12:51
Also another thing. If you have, if you know you're going to be going to a Carrie and dinner, that's what we call in the Midwest. Calm elsewhere, carrying dinner where you're supposed to carry in

spk_1:   13:05
potlucks. They're kind of

spk_0:   13:07
something like that. Sprouts that you sprout yourself, make a really great thing to take. I think you should maybe use one of those bulls. Forget, like the three or four little

spk_1:   13:23
relish trays

spk_0:   13:24
Yeah, relish tray or something like that has got three or four little places nukes to put stuff, and I would label them because a lot of people don't like to eat what they don't know what they are, but I would label them like a self of us. Proud beings crowds.

spk_1:   13:42
Bean sprouts are thicker and more robust, so if you're going for the crunch, those are nice. I find this sprouting efficiency of being sprouts is not as good as for these smaller seeds. If you want something that adds a little bit of, ah, spice and an interesting taste change like I often like for salads that air based off spinach or something like that, things like a reddish sprouts are good for that. So you get something different from different things. I've I like. I prefer the smaller seeds and a lot of mild stuff, but a little bit of radish or broccoli or stuff thrown in for a flavor kit.

spk_0:   14:17
Yeah, Brett, I Broccoli's not bad radishes too strong for me.

spk_1:   14:22
Yeah, keep the radishes separate, so I put a Sprinkle on my salads and a lot more of things like alfalfa or on my sandwiches. They actually substitute very nicely for lettuce and sandwiches. They make a sandwich, much more filling and more robust feeling. So

spk_0:   14:39
I'm not as big a fan. Yeah,

spk_1:   14:41
if food is limiting for whatever reason, and one sandwich is all you're gonna get and it's not really gonna feel like enough, it'll feel like more if you put a big by a pile of sprouts on it.

spk_0:   14:52
Plus it's gonna really boost the nutritional. These are really, really good quality foods that were adding here. Other freshly ground in the middle of winter. Come on, you're not what else you're gonna grow.

spk_1:   15:08
And frankly, when I have had a lot of sprouts and no other greens around in the winter, I've made salads just out of the sprouts, mostly based off the milder types, but then throwing in some spicier ones. Little salad dressing, some other stuff. If you if you want to put in there But again it's bulk. It's micro nutrients. It's a change of taste. It's more filling its fiber for very little work. Very cheap doesn't require electricity to run. It's a nice winter solution

spk_0:   15:44
way should try an experiment, so I want to try an experiment. I just thought of the experiment. We should try it now. We could maybe report back next year. How about we get a small package sprouts and put it in the freezer, have freezing and wait a year and then see how well they Germany

spk_1:   16:02
sprout seeds? Sure,

spk_0:   16:04
I should do fine thinking.

spk_1:   16:06
I've left him out of the freezer for a year in the head, then be fine.

spk_0:   16:09
Well, I I don't want to do wait for five years to report back. If they survive a year, they'll survive five years because they're not gonna ensuring it all

spk_1:   16:21
in the freezer. Yeah, I haven't frozen any. I've left in the room temperature for

spk_0:   16:25
trying to freeze. Now you could buy sprout seeds in many different ways one of the ways that if I were going by storage sprout scenes, I would go ahead, buy them in the bottle in the plastic bottle with seal on it, because keeping them away from the oxygen is is probably a pretty pretty important

spk_1:   16:50
Ziploc for good to

spk_0:   16:51
storage. But for just a little while, but I wouldn't worry about it. We buyers in bulk out the little bags.

spk_1:   17:01
Yeah, and They're originally vacuum sealed,

spk_0:   17:05
right? But we buyers we buyers from people who do sprouting all winter long, By

spk_1:   17:11
the way, I have made an experiment before. You don't have to buy the sprout seeds. I've let some of my radishes go to seed and collected those and use those to make sprouts throughout the next winter, I have Let's one of my broccoli plants go to sea and collected some of those thes sprouting. Efficiency was not as high as the expensive sprouting seat I bought, but it's not hard to collect a whole bunch of radish seeds. And a little bit of inefficiency is not a problem.

spk_0:   17:43
What have you tried the, uh, about Health Office spit seeds?

spk_1:   17:51
I don't grow my own alfalfa. So no, I haven't collected my own alfalfa seeds. Theo. Nothing. I used alfalfa. Four is as a soil stabilizer of Houston in place. But then I didn't go around and collect seed, and even if I wanted to, the deer probably would've beat me to it. And sometimes I use it as a green cover crop in the garden. I'll throw some of that on there late in the season, after everything else is gone just to add some nutrients to the soil

spk_0:   18:21
I was actually thinking about for redoing sprouting to Beyonce.

spk_1:   18:26
It makes sense. I just haven't ever grown alfalfa to adulthood and try to collect seed from it. Considering how it grows, it would be harder to collect seed from alfalfa than from radishes and broccoli, I imagine, because the seed heads are smaller and more distributed. It's not hard at all from radishes. You let him. You let the radish go to seed. You let it go ahead and dry when it looks like it's ready to fall off. You just put a big plastic container underneath it. Rubble that stuff in your hands to break up the seed pods. It rains the seats down. Then I actually did the old blow the chap away thing where you put it in front of a fan or in front of your big glowy face and pour the stuff out while you're blowing and the light stuff blows away and the seed falls into the container below. That's how I cleaned.

spk_0:   19:24
You just said my big blow we face. I put it in front of my big glowy face. What are you saying?

spk_1:   19:31
I'm saying you puff up your cheeks and make like you're blowing a trumpet and pour the stream of seed and Chaffin front of your face and the chap blows away and the seed is more dense, so it falls faster in their resistance.

spk_0:   19:47
My caveat for today is as a brass player, I'm going to have to correct you. You don't puff up your cheeks when you blow a trumpet. I know there's one very famous person who did, but that's

spk_1:   20:02
that's right. They were supposed to be doing the Louis Armstrong impression.

spk_0:   20:05
There's horrible on Fisher involved, I e.

spk_1:   20:11
I wondered if that would make his trip.

spk_0:   20:13
You're on pressure now that we've got past that.

spk_1:   20:18
Okay for clearing staff, However, I thought the visual image would be helpful.

spk_0:   20:23
I want a fire truck, big fire truck sitting over there and what it's for. Sale to

spk_1:   20:27
it is for sale.

spk_0:   20:28
That's not really the truck I want. I don't want a pumper trucks. You are a public trust,

spk_1:   20:35
although, you know, for picking apples.

spk_0:   20:38
Yeah, for picking Apple would be nice. So when we go drop 20,000 so we could pick apples with a fire truck.

spk_1:   20:44
Or you could buy Dorf apple trees in an apple picker, which costs 10 bucks.

spk_0:   20:49
That might be a better plan.

spk_1:   20:51
Sounds like it easier to park.

spk_0:   20:53
Okay, what else do you have to say about sprouting? Froze

spk_1:   20:57
Once they have grown to the state where you're ready to eat him, they don't last very long, especially without refrigeration. So plan to eat him fairly fast in the refrigerator. They're pretty good for about a week longer than that. They go south in a hurry.

spk_0:   21:12
One good thing is they're pretty. Once you figure out your growing season, they're pretty consistent Where they grow based upon the heat, in the amount of if the

spk_1:   21:23
temperature is consistent, they slow in the cold.

spk_0:   21:28
Yeah. So you pretty much got an idea. Once you've grown your first crop, how long it's gonna take? So you can pretty well planned that. Okay. I'm gonna need to start these. I'll be out of sprouts by Tuesday of next year. You could start.

spk_1:   21:42
Yeah. Keep rotating.

spk_0:   21:44
Yeah, and we usually see usually rotates different flavor assistant. Not all the same thing over and over again. But

spk_1:   21:53
I often actually grow mixes too. So I'll put in a bunch of alfalfa. One tray is pretty much all alfalfa, so I can have a container of that that he won't object to eating. And the other trail put in some alfalfa and a little bit of radish and a little bit of broccoli and some other stuff. I'm not a big one on beans myself, but a lot of people, like

spk_0:   22:11
actually big, premade mixes of seeds. And we've never found them to be as good as I think. You just better off getting your own individual seeds and mixing them yourself. Because that way you get a taste and the other beings were neither one of us really big bean sprout eaters there. Okay,

spk_1:   22:29
beings take longer to see. You wouldn't want to put him in a mix with smaller seeds. That's one of the problems I ran into with the commercial mixes that started with Is Yeah, they had Awesome. It's a big old things, like garbanzo beans and some smaller beans, their seeds like lentils and then some tiny things, like alfalfa. Generally, the smaller the seed, the quicker it sprouts, which they're good biological reasons. I won't trouble you with your welcome But anyway, if you're mixing, mixing similar size seeds is probably about right. Okay.

spk_0:   23:10
Anything else you want to

spk_1:   23:10
add? They're good, and they're not just for the tree hugger set. Guys, don't let the stigma stop you Don't tell me there's no stigma out there. I've heard it. I've seen it. It's not just hippie food.

spk_0:   23:27
Okay, so here's what we're gonna do. We're gonna say good bye to you, and you can go ahead and hang up the hang up the podcast and you'll have heard the important stuff. Or conversely, you could hang on for a couple minutes Maur for the addendum, which we're going to put on. Where? Where she actually explains that little comment of little seeds and big seeds. But this is totally X ray. You don't need to us. This is just biological trivia.

spk_1:   24:01
And she's which is free to take

spk_0:   24:03
I are off about it.

spk_1:   24:07
Spill the bean sprout.

spk_0:   24:08
Yeah. So what we're gonna do is we're gonna say good bye and you could be done with podcast. Unless you want to hear the extra scientific gobbledy cook, which is gonna be coming right after we say goodbye. Okay, so your choice entirely up to you. We're gonna hang it up right now. So

spk_1:   24:26
by now or hello now

spk_0:   24:31
Okay, spill the beans. You know you want to

spk_1:   24:34
In the ecology of living things, there are a couple of different strategies you can choose from. You can make a whole bunch of little bitty offspring that are not very well provisioned. Understand that most of you are going to die and expect that a small percentage will survive and you'll still be successful. Or you could make a smaller amount of offspring. You could give each one a whole lot of care, which, in the case of plants, mains provisioning the seed. It's either I have a whole bunch of baskets with a whole bunch of eggs or put all your eggs in one basket. But really watch that basket. If a plants making big seeds, it's provisioning each one a lot more fully, then if they're making a whole bunch of little bitty seats.

spk_0:   25:24
So, for example, type one think dandelion dandelion makes all these little bitty seeds, and they just fly away in there. Type

spk_1:   25:36
one. And I'm so proud of him for recognizing Lee. Yeah, or was it just lucky we're calling it type one when that is the actual name of that reproductive strategy you

spk_0:   25:47
know, with the fact that you're not married to a done. I

spk_1:   25:51
thought so. That's why I was saying I was proud of you for doing that of top your head of moment.

spk_0:   25:57
Think apples are good.

spk_1:   26:00
Apples are pretty much along the type three line. As plants go, plants don't go as far along. That is, say people. Type one is Don't put all your eggs in one basket. A lot of them will die. You expect some of them will survive Grasses follow this That make a whole bunch of a little bitty tiny seeds. Alfalfa sprouts come from this type of seed, since each seems small.

spk_0:   26:28
Yeah, remember, Dave,

spk_1:   26:31
Since each seed is very small, they don't have many, much energy reserves. They put out little shoots that get him out quick, and they expect to start photo since this right away. So they are the shortest start to eat sprout, and they also have the shortest survival after that, and they are least likely to survive it. If you are not a friend of sprouts and let them dry out. On the other hand, type three reproductive strategy is where you put all your eggs in one basket and watch that basket. Smaller number of individual attempts, which means smaller number of seeds. But each seed is bigger. Each seed is better provisioned. These guys are better competitors. They can outlast the competition because they've got a lot more internal reserves to rely on before they have to depend on their own. Photosynthesis and soil collection defeat him so they're better at surviving bad conditions because they've got internal reserves. What they're gonna do is spend a lot more time building route before they put up very much in the way of shoot. And it's the shoot we want to eat, so they're closer to two weeks before they make a good edible sprout. The sprouts last for another two weeks after you pick him. If you put him in the fridge and take care of a well, they last longer. They're bigger sprouts. They've got more crunch. One is not particularly more nutritious than the other as a group, if you're wondering what happened to Type two, they are defense sitters who kind of makes some attempt at satisfying both. It means they don't there, Jack of all trades and master of none. And actually, radish seeds are pretty much in that category as faras. The sprouting seeds go a little bit longer to sprout than grass seeds. Quite a bit faster than beans. They're real. Okay,

spk_0:   28:32
so there you have it. The Borte shin is done. She's relaxed. Now she's breathing more calmly, securely knowing that she has fulfilled her mission for today of teaching some type of biological something or other. Sure, all right, thank you for listening, and we'll talk to you later.