I'm still sprouting... and other creations!

Since I first posted about sprouts after reading about them in Nourishing Traditions, I've been continuing to grow them regularly. Alfalfa has to be my stand-out favourite, it works every time with no issues and its great to have some on hand in the sprouter or in the fridge to use in summer salads and sandwiches.

Alfalfa is my favourite sprout

I did branch out and try fenugreek. This is a very useful herb and the seeds smell beautiful, so I couldn't wait to taste the sprouts, but my first few efforts ended in tragedy. All the sprouts clumped together in the middle of the jar and there wasn't much sprouting action, they just ended up rotting, very frustrating! I tried several times following some of the advice here. I put less seed in the jar, I broke up the seeds/sprouts to make sure they didn't clump together and washed them carefully. I had absolutely no luck until a friend gave me some different seeds, which did work. The lesson here is don't give up on sprouting! Try some different seeds, something will work for you!

fenugreek worked eventually (and tastes sprouty)
when I got some decent seeds, DON'T GIVE UP!

I was also insprired by this post on hummus (and found out that chickpeas are called garbanzo beans in Spanish/the USA), as I'd heard that I could use sprouted chickpeas to make sprouted hummus, but had no idea how to even make normal hummus, so this was a good place to start. I found another recipe for sprouted hummus, and it turns out that instead of soaking and cooking the chickpeas, I can just start them sprouting instead. This seemed like a good idea, as cooking the beans uses a lot of energy, time and patience, whereas sprouting is low energy and easy, as well as the extra goodness of sprouts! As I never stick to a recipe, I mixed up the two recipes and ended up just blending the following ingredients.

Sprouted chickpea hummus

1 c sprouted chickpeas
1 clove garlic
a bit of lemon juice
splash of extra virgin olive oil
some chopped parsley
2 t tahini

It would have been nice to get the mix a little smoother, but my mini food processor was struggling as it was! It had more of a pesto texture, which gave me my next idea.....

ingredients - forgot the garlic for the photo!
(note that lemon juice is in the bottle on the right, I squeezed a
huge bag of them and froze the juice for later)

before

After, yum!

I also made Macadamia nut and basil pesto (recipe here), as we had an excess of both basil and nuts (not from our tree, just they've been cheap at the markets lately). My husband helped me to crack about a cup of nuts and I made the pesto in our mini food processor, with a little of our homemade strong cheddar cheese, it was delicious!

so much basil!

The ingredients

the finished product, yum again!

Do you sprout? Any good recipe suggestions?

Farm update - August 2017

Its been cold this month, and very nice to have the fire going every night. Here's a photo of my boy in his cape, great for late night woofing at things. Most of July we were either preparing for the butcher to come or putting meat away. Its always a big job, but its only once a year, and its all done now. My lovely neighbour came over to help, so it was fun to have the company and work together. Taz was a champion once again as she helped us to move cattle in the yards ready to load for the market. Gus is not at that level yet and had to stay home (he cries when he gets left behind, but he just gets in the way and scatters the cattle). We have had a few sprinkles of rain here and there, but also plenty of cold nights, so the grass is mostly dead and dry, waiting for the warmer weather to revive our summer-active pasture. Gus in his cape Taz after she helped to move cattle Food and cooking It was all about beef in July and we are v...

Cooking and eating beans

When I was growing up, my family never ate many dried beans, they just weren't something that was used much in NZ cuisine. If I did eat beans, it was always from a can (and most likely baked beans). And until recently I was still using beans from a can, but it can be difficult to get organic beans, and to find cans not lined with BPA. Then I had an opportunity to buy some organic dry goods in bulk, so I bought 5kg of kidney beans, 5kg of adzuki beans and 5kg of chickpea (garbanzo beans). I know, that is a lot of beans. And then I didn't really know what to do with them! Not just what dishes to put them in, but how to prepare them, I just didn't know what method to use. So I decided it was time to learn how to use all these beans that I bought, here's what I found out. I started with an excellent ebook called The Everything Beans Book , from Katie at Kitchen Stewardship, which has lots of bean recipes, but more importantly, an explanation of h...

Guest post: Is there a place for power tools in the garden?

One of my regular readers and commenters offered to write a guest post about a horticulture course, its quite a funny read, with some serious insights into our technology obsession. If you'd like to submit a guest post, email me at eight.acres.liz {at} gmail.com. While I am always happy to share links back to your blog or website, this contributor preferred to remain anonymous. I hope you enjoy their story.... -**- -**- -**- -**- -**- -**- -**- -**- -**- -**- -**- -**- -**- -**- Just a few days ago our daily horticulture classes were interrupted by an invitation to review some new gardening gadgets. The idea was to open half a dozen of electric hand trimmers , test them and fill in some review about their goods and bads. As nothing is more dear to a student – even a “hort “ one - to escape routine and mess around till lunchtime, we opened the boxes and got down to business. What did we...

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