They say when you’re a tradesman it’s always your own home which is last to get any attention. I feel a bit like that at the moment – the little potager I designed for a friend is absolutely burgeoning with peas, beans, courgettes, tomatoes, cabbage, lettuce, beetroot and carrots – not to mention aubergines and peppers, figs and a whole lot more. She plucks supper every night from her own little Eden and eats fresh, fresh, fresh. It’s too late to play catch up now – nature is ruthless and if you snooze you loose but my son came up with a brilliant solution to my dilemma – grow some microgreens.
A microgreen is a tiny vegetable green, just an inch or two high, with a single central stem, easily grown in a very short time and packed with flavour and goodness. They started as a trendy fad in 1980s California but have become mainstream. Take a look at these beautiful little cotyledon leaves of red cabbage, bursting with vitamin c. .
Microgreens give a real fillip of texture, colour and goodness to all sorts of dishes including some deserts.
So how do we grow them? Basically they are what we’ve been eating for years in an egg sandwich, good old mustard cress. They need a shallow container with seed quality soil and many people find guttering the perfect container. – they look better stacked on a fence I think.
These terracotta saucers would probably do the trick for me.
If you think you could really get into these trendy little lovelies you could invest in a book such as the one below.
Meanwhile – just go for it. There is plenty of advice on the internet and all the major seed producers like Suttons and Marshalls do special microgreen packs. You too could be harvesting fresh produce from your garden in a matter of days.
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