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Sprouts as an Ingredient: |
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Sprouts can replace many of the seeds used as ingredients in
nutritional supplements and foods. The choice of which one to use
comes down to which food group you want: Seeds are like bread,
sprouts are vegetables.
There may only be a few days difference between a seed and its
sprout, but enough changes occur during that time that the two are
considered to be completely different foods. One is an inactive
material with few life processes being evident, the other is full of
the enzyme reactions that govern cell growth, repair, and
differentiation, including the hormones and other messenger
molecules that turn these processes on and off.
An examination of the protein forms found in wheat seeds and wheat
sprouts will show a striking change in the complexity and diversity
of proteins as enzymes are formed during the sprouting process. This
is as you'd expect: the sprout is a complex living organism, the
seed is still mostly raw material waiting to be built into one.
Sprouts are whole young plants, most other vegetables eaten by
humans are from adult plants and then only from a part of the adult.
Sprouts consist of all parts of the embryo or juvenile plant -
roots, young leaves and whatever is left in the seed. They are an
entire plant in its most active growth stage - and when processes
that repair cells, stop uncontrolled division and protect DNA from
free radical damage are also the most active.
So, although sprouts are a vegetable, there are reasons to think
that they offer a different nutritive effect then most other
vegetables. If diverse mixtures of live active enzymes from growing
plants are an important component of the diet, then sprouts would be
a key way of delivering a full spectrum of those nutrients in a
concentrated form. |
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