Sprouting Schedule for Mung Beans and Alfalfa

Mung beans and alfalfa go from dry seed to harvest in 4-6 days if you rinse every 12 hours.

Sprouting is the shortest path from seed to food in this whole guide: home-sprouted mung beans and alfalfa are ready in 4-6 days, and the only equipment is a jar, water and a drainable lid.

The method is a rhythm, not a recipe. Rinse the seed, swirl, and drain fully every 12 hours — morning and evening. The rinse does two jobs at once: it hydrates the seed and it washes away the stagnation that turns a jar sour.

Draining matters as much as rinsing. A jar that sits in its own rinse water smells off within a day or two; a jar drained hard and left tilted stays fresh to day six. If you catch a sour smell or feel slime, discard and restart — that is the schedule's one real failure mode.

Days one and two show little; days three and four the jar fills visibly; by days four to six the sprouts are ready. Give one final rinse, drain well, and eat within a few days.

Because sprouts need no medium and no light, they run in any corner of the kitchen while the trays take the lit shelf — the two systems complement each other. When you are ready for soil, /microgreens-tray-setup is the next page; the jar never needs the math in /grow-light-shelf.

• Day 0 — soak, drain, set the jar tilted
• Every 12 h — rinse, swirl, drain fully
• Days 1-2 — seed swells, first roots appear
• Days 3-4 — the jar fills with shoots
• Days 4-6 — harvest, final rinse, drain well

Further reading

• Microgreens Tray Setup: Seed to First Cut
• Grow Light and Shelf Sizing for Home Trays