chickpea sprouts in a green salad........conditioning children to eat healthy..


I had posted a black chick pea salad in the initial days of my blog and that remains one of the most visited recipes,  many of my friends have adapted that recipe to their taste and I have received many compliments. Actually it is a good way to make children and fussy people eat their fibers and vitamin - minerals.

Yes, children love such sprout salads if we eat these with as much interest as we want them to have in healthy foods. Whenever I have served this salad in a gathering that has a few children too, the sprouts salad gets picked up more by the children as they love the textures. Some toddlers would pick it with their tiny fingers and have fun eating such a salad so make sure you don’t add chillies when serving to toddlers. Note that toddlers need a bit of monitoring when they eat such foods that may get stuck into their nostrils as they breath in while eating carelessly.

Kala chana or Indian black chickpeas has been considered healthy food in Indian homes and many people have it with a little jaggery for breakfast everyday. Arvind says he used to love it when he lived alone for a while because sprouting chana is easy and he loves it with jaggery. Try that sometime and let me know.

Raw onions are one of the healthy ingredients which gets ignored easily even though it is so easy to incorporate them in our daily meals. I want to emphasize the nutritional value of onions for children as the high levels of Vit. C and iron are so much needed by them. Moreover, children are prone to allergic rhinitis, bronchitis and to asthma now a days thanks to the increasing suspended particles in our atmosphere and onion is very good for improving immunity. This salad can be actually great for children who become irritable and refuse to eat because of their continued illness. Of course this kala chana sprouts salad with raw onions is great for adults too.

Children can be made to eat raw onions very easily, it may be surprising to many but children love texture combined with good taste, the onions may be sharp sometimes for children but onions soak up flavors of lime and other salad dressings quickly and becomes child friendly. I am actually sharing my real life experience with many children.

One of my friend's 5 yr old daughter (asthma patient) was very irritable and refused to eat anything except maggi, sometimes even raw noodles...eeks !!

And when I suggested this salad she liked it and could eat a bowl of this everyday. Later I suggested a seasoning made with the maggi taste maker as she insisted to have maggi too and we wanted her to wean from Maggi. It was so amazing to see that she loved this salad with maggi taste maker more than the two minute noodle.

The next step towards her conditioning was to move to a homemade chinese dressing, everyone was really happy with this arrangement to our relief.

Now see what the WHO has to say about onions being therapeutic.

The World Health Organization (WHO) supports the use of onions for the treatment of poor appetite and to prevent atherosclerosis. In addition, onion extracts are recognized by WHO for providing relief in the treatment of coughs and colds, asthma and bronchitis. Onions are known to decrease bronchial spasms. An onion extract was found to decrease allergy-induced bronchial constriction in asthma patients.

Onions are a very rich source of fructo-oligosaccharides. These oligomers stimulate the growth of healthy bifidobacteria and suppress the growth of potentially harmful bacteria in the colon. In addition, they can reduce the risk of tumors developing in the colon.
Check out this site too for more info about the nutritious onions, and click here to see how arugula is a good choice.

The salad recipe is simple and I must say that simple is not always boring. The texture and the flavor of the food is so important for fussy and picky eaters. Be assured that this salad will be loved by all.   I have never found a person (including children) who doesn't like this salad. Of course it's a flexible recipe too. Use your favorite sprouts and your favorite greens, onions and green chillies are a must for the lemon dressing version though.

So for the lemon dressing version you have to make a dressing with 

1 tbsp of  lemon juice 
salt to taste and green chillies to taste 
a dash of mustard oil 
and a cup of chopped onions are soaked in the dressing for 15 minutes, later it is mixed with sprouted chickpea and chopped arugula. Done. 


For the chinese dressing 1 tsp of vinegar 
1 tsp of soy sauce 
1 tbsp of olive or sesame oil 
1 tsp of finely chopped green chillies
and freshly crushed garlic is mixed with a fork, onions are soaked in it for a couple of minutes and then mixed with the remaining ingredients.

Don’t you find it simply irresistible?

You can even add some fruits like chopped pineapples and pomegranate arils to this salad to make it even better.


For me it is a bowl of my daily dose of raw salad these days, second helpings are so very common with this salad. Wouldn’t you love your children going for second and third helpings of this salad?

You can use just about any kind of sprouts and any kind of greens, raw onions are a must and a tangy dressing, that's all you need.

Enjoy good health.

Comments

  1. hey looks great......i like eating my rajmas/chholas boiled with onion/tomato/green chillies and salt/pepper...never experimented with other seasonings...let me try this.....also i can use my remaining arugula :)

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  2. Hy Sangeeta,

    Salad looks very healthy n colorful. First time here...Amazed with your healthy collection of recipes. Glad to follow u. Do drop in at my blog sometime.

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  3. I adore the chickpeas...and the salad does look very healthy and delicious.

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  4. Love the color of it and of course, it is healthy too :)

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  5. Dear Sangeeta
    Very nice dish indeed and good for young and old alike
    I have been eating these spouts since I got married..( I wish I didn't , then I wouldn't have eaten sprouts with Raw Haldi and JAggery ha ha)

    Have a nice weekend

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  6. Such a colourful and healthy salad.

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  7. this looks delicious,,and healthy ,thnks for postin this

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  8. Thankyou everybody......
    this is a salad we are all familiar with , i just wanted to emphasize that it can be a great temptation to children as i witnessed.

    Dear Ushnish , it's very healthy with raw haldi n jaggery n i love that .

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  9. thats a real healthy and tasty salad. we actually eat chickpeas with cucumber, onion and tomato but this looks delicious. thanks for posting.

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  10. yes, i agree with you, raw onions give a lot of texture to many dishes and are sure healthy. this salad looks so delicious and yummy!

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  11. I tried this today with a little modification (sorry!) I added boiled chickpeas instead of sprouts ( i somehow i can't eat sprouts, get stomach ache after eating any sprouts)....the smell of chinese dressing was heavenly..my husband was wondering how i made it at home....it was yummy and will make it again...

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  12. Wow, this looks great. I haven't been eating as healthy lately, but I have to change that before I gain the weight I've worked hard to lose. I'm going to start with this dish.

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  13. Thanks everybody for all the sweet comments...

    Crazy ...if you get stomach ache by eating sprouts it might be because of fungal or bacterial contamination of the sprouts which is very common due to the long time taken by the seeds to sprouts........you should wash the sprouting seeds daily under running water and before preparing the salad too....eating them raw is the most healthy way to have them....

    and thanks for trying this recipe too n letting me know about it....i guess the chinese dressing is something which can tempt you to try such salads .....

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  14. conditioning the children to eat healthy is a long drawn process and requires lots and lots and lots of patience and innovation. But the point is that not only can this be done, but this is something that should absolutely be done.
    I have found that a "democratic" method is always more likely to succeed, once the children are old enough to understand. Explaining to the children the reason for choosing one dish over the other and involving them in the decision of what we are going to eat today is my recommendation based on my own experience. :D

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