How to Grow Rye Microgreens in Australia

Rye grass is the young leaf of cereal rye (Secale cereale, family Poaceae), grown on a tray and juiced raw. Sold as rye microgreens, it is not ryegrass (Lolium), the lawn and pasture grass, and grows as wheatgrass and barley grass do. It tastes much like wheatgrass, is usually ready 6 to 10 days from the soak, and its dry grain is checked for ergot first.

Three mistakes that matter

1. Soaking the grain unchecked. Rye is the grain ergot attacks most often, and whatever sits among the grain goes into the tray and the juice. Check it first, as Soaking and Sowing describes.
2. Piling the grain up. Grain sown several deep traps water and still air around the lowest layer, and mould starts there. Spread one even, dense layer.
3. Leaving the cover on too long. Grain covered too long, in warm, still air, can go mouldy before it sprouts. Lift the cover on time, and air the tray daily in muggy weather.

When to sprout

Rye grass grows indoors in any month, and a room near 21°C suits it best. A cooler room slows the tray without stopping it: in the field, rye germinates at temperatures as low as about 1°C. Heat brings a different risk, because warm, humid air helps mould take hold.

In a muggy Brisbane February or a northern wet season, use the coolest, airiest room you have.

Food safety

Rye grass starts as a raw sprout, in warm, damp conditions that suit bacteria. Bacteria inside a contaminated grain cannot be rinsed away.

• Grow untreated whole rye grain sold for sprouting, not grain for sowing or stockfeed, which can carry fungicide, as which seeds to sprout explains.
• Wash your hands first. Wash and rinse the trays, jar, scissors and juicer, then sanitise them before the first batch and between batches. Use a dishwasher that can sanitise, usually on its longest, hottest setting. Otherwise, soak them in very hot water (77°C for 30 seconds). Or soak them for 30 seconds in plain unscented household bleach at 25 mL to 10 L of cold water. Make it up fresh each day and use it as its label directs. Let them air-dry.
• Soak and rinse the grain only in water fit to drink.
• Potting mix can carry Legionella bacteria. Follow the bag's warning: dampen the mix, wear gloves and a P2 mask, and wash your hands afterwards.
• Keep grass and trays away from raw meat, poultry and seafood, and store the grass above them in a fridge at 5°C or colder. Cooked sprouts for anyone at higher risk are eaten straight away. Leftovers are cooled, kept in the fridge, used within a day of cooking and reheated until steaming hot.
• Mould on the grain, slimy brown roots or a sour smell end a tray: compost the grain and mix, and wash the tray. Sprouts can carry harmful bacteria while looking, smelling and tasting normal, so none of those is a test of safety. See sprout problems and safety.

What you need

Set a tray with drainage holes over a solid catch tray, and keep a second holed tray to invert as a cover. Fill the top tray with 1 to 2 cm of seed raising mix or a coir mat. Add scissors, a spray bottle, a juicer made for grass and untreated rye grain. For the first rinses, use a sprouting jar, a jar with a mesh lid or a colander.

To size another tray, cover its empty base with dry grain in one even, dense layer: that is the amount to soak.

Soaking and Sowing

From soak to sowing usually takes one or two days, so an evening start fits most routines.

1. Tip the dry grain onto a plate, pick out stones, chaff and broken grains, and check for ergot, as Cutting and Storing describes.
2. Rinse the grain, then cover it with two to three times its volume of cool drinking water. Soak it 6 to 12 hours: the short end in a warm kitchen, the long end on a cold bench.
3. Drain and rinse it, and do not soak it again. Rinse and drain every 8 to 12 hours until most grains show a root tip.
4. Water the mix or mat until it is damp right through, then let any puddles drain away.
5. Spread the grain in one even, dense layer and press it gently onto the surface without burying it.
6. Cover the tray and leave it somewhere dim until the shoots stand 2.5 to 5 cm tall.

Between rinses, rest the jar upside down or the colander over a bowl, because grain left sitting in water can ferment and spoil. Due to quarantine restrictions and our shipping policy, we cannot send rye grain to Western Australia or Tasmania.

Day by day

Where the water sits decides the tray: in the mix, not on the blades or in the catch tray. Days count from the start of the soak.

To water from below, fill the catch tray, let the mix drink for about ten minutes and pour off the remainder. A fan on low or a window open nearby keeps damp air off the blades.

Cutting and Storing

Rye grass is ready once the blades stand upright at about 10 to 15 cm. Cut a handful with clean scissors 2 to 3 cm above the mix.

Keep water off the blades for their last 8 to 12 hours. Seal the cut grass in a clean bag or container and refrigerate it as Food safety describes. It keeps up to about a week, though a fresh cut juices best. Rinse it under cool running water just before juicing, and drink the juice as soon as it is made. After the final cut, compost the roots and spent mix.

Rye grain can carry ergot (Claviceps purpurea), a fungus. It forms hard, dark purple to black bodies about 1 to 2 cm long, longer than the grain. Their alkaloids are poisonous, and the Food Standards Code limits ergot in cereal grains to 500 mg per kilogram. A packet with ergot bodies in it goes back to the seller and is not grown.

Rye grain also contains gluten, which people with coeliac disease avoid. Coeliac Australia's gluten free diet guide says barley grass and wheat grass do not contain gluten. With rye grass, the caution is grain and husk near the cut, not the blade.

Common problems

White fuzz near the base. Root hairs coat the roots only, evenly, and flatten when misted. Mould can be white too, but grows in patchy, cobwebby tufts on grain and mix, stays when wet and smells musty.

Sour smell or brown, slimy roots. Water has sat too long in the mix or catch tray. Throw it out, as Food safety describes, and empty the catch tray sooner next time.

Patchy or no germination. Old grain, grain that dried out between rinses and a cold bench can each slow or stop it. If nothing has sprouted within a week, compost it and start again.

Tips

1. For a steady supply, start a small tray every two or three days.
2. Dry rye grain can keep for about two years sealed in a cool, dark, dry place.
3. Sow rye with wheat in a cool month for a red and green tray.
4. The grain grasses article compares wheat, barley and oat grass.