grow your own pea shoots « Penny Golightly

Windowsill kitchen garden: Week 10

April 18th, 2010 by Penny Golightly

I’ve had a real stroke of luck this weekend – I was given a mini greenhouse as a gift, so have managed to get some of the overcrowded windowsill sorted out. The dinky greenhouse is now full of baby tomato plants, and I sowed a couple of trays of various salad leaves and herbs as well for good measure.

Meanwhile, back on the windowsill, the not-so-dwarf beans are about to burst into flower. And they’re too tall to go into the greehouse, so maybe I’ll have to put them out in a bigger pot on the back doorstep soon.

Here’s the alfalfa, nearly ready to eat. Maybe needs a couple more days. I suspect that this will be a lifesaver in the winter when not much else will grow – it’s quick and it’s healthy, it’s easy to grow (just rinse daily and drain) and it costs pence. OK, maybe it’s not what everyone would call gourmet, but it’s good for a bit of variety.

We’ve had a couple of home-grown salads in the last week. One was a gorgeous mix of pea shoots, baby lettuce and radish microgreens. The pea shoots are re-growing already:

Last week I also learned that some cheap brands of dried peas can be used for pea shoots, including ‘Leo’ brand. They’re 26p a packet in Asda at the moment, or 27p in Tesco, if your local one stocks that type. When I finally get my hands on some I’ll be growing them by the trayful.

The lettuce is supposed to be a ‘cut and come again’ Salad Bowl, but I have my doubts about its ability to regenerate. Seriously, look at the state of it:

We didn’t eat all the radish sprouts – here’s what’s left of the first big batch. They were delicious. Greenhouse or not, I think these, along with cress, pea shoots and herbs, will always have a home on the widowsill.

The land cress, spinach and rocket experiment is not doing much at all. Fingers crossed that at least the rocket will grow this week – it’s like a weed outdoors.

Those spring onions have got their act together now:

Some of the many tomato plants:

I think I’ll grow a couple of them indoors anyway, in case of blight. And finally, the cucumber plant seems set to make an escape bid. Either that or it’s doing an impression of Dustin Hoffman at the end of The Graduate. Not sure which.

Are you growing your own food this year? Do you have any success stories?

Tags: baby leaf salad, grow herbs indoors, grow salad indoors, grow your own pea shoots, growing food indoors, how to grow pea shoots, how to sprout alfalfa, kitchen windowsill gardening, windowsill kitchen garden, windowsill sprouting
Posted in Home & garden | No Comments »

Windowsill kitchen garden: Week 5

March 11th, 2010 by Penny Golightly

Week 5 is here, and the longer days and sunny moments have cheered the windowsill up no end. I thought I’d ring the changes with some of the things I’ve been growing, so off I went back to Poundland for another of their bargain £1 mixed packets of seed.

I bought their ‘fresh salad’ multipack, which contains radish, cress, spring onion, tomato, iceberg lettuce and cucumber, all of which I hear can be grown indoors. The tomato variety is Moneymaker, which I won’t be growing this year as I’ve set my heart on growing other varieties (more about that later). The lettuce will probably be eaten at the baby leaf stage, or there won’t be enough room for it. Iceberg isn’t exactly gourmet, but it does have a mild flavour and a good crunch, and it mixes well with pea shoots.

Speaking of which, I cut the last lot of shoots for a garnish. They tasted as good as the first crop, but there were fewer of them and they grew smaller leaves. To complete the experiment I’ll try to grow a third set of shoots from the same pot, although I’m not too hopeful they’ll be as good. Here’s what they look like now, rather depleted.

Here are some of the herbs: dill (new), mint and parsley. The basil is still being finnicky and I’m probably going to end up re-seeding the pots at this rate. I have loads of different seeds left over from my outdoor herb garden so will probably try a few different varieties on the windowsill too to see how they turn out.

Next up, the radishes and cucumber were planted 6 days ago and are already going strong. They’re the pots on the left. Will be pulling up radish thinnings soon and adding them to salads – sowed 8 seeds as an experiment and wasn’t expecting them to have quite so much oomph. Haven’t started the spring onions off yet, but maybe at the weekend…

Mini-lettuces just sprouted, and all I can say is that I hope the other salad leaves start to take note of their work ethic:

The spicy salad leaves are still looking like overgrown cress, the slackers. Might decide to grow a second batch soon, but start them off in a mini-propagator instead and hot-house the little gits.

Speaking of mini propagators, the tomato seeds I planted (cherry and plum) last week are doing really well.

I’ve been bartering on GardenSwapShop and bidding on eBay to get some more interesting salad seeds too, as cheaply as possible. I now have red and green salad bowl, Lazio spinach, red mustard, lollo rossa and rocket to sow, all of which are cut-and-come again varieties so hopefully we’ll get several crops out of each plant. There’s also some land cress, which is supposed to be easier to grow than watercress, but let’s wait and see.

The total spend so far is £3.99, which I’m hoping will keep me in salad ingredients for several months. About the same price as a couple of bags of supermarket baby leaf salad, and with lots of variety so we don’t get bored.

Are you growing food in your kitchen too? How’s it coming along?

Tags: grow herbs indoors, grow your own pea shoots, growing food indoors, how to grow pea shoots, kitchen windowsill gardening, windowsill herbs, windowsill kitchen garden
Posted in Home & garden | 4 Comments »

Windowsill kitchen garden: Week 4

March 3rd, 2010 by Penny Golightly

Can it really be week four already? The windowsill doesn’t seem to be getting much direct sunlight, and it’s not the warmest place in the house, in spite of the double glazing. During the sunny days earlier this week I moved some of the pots outside or to sunnier windowsills at the front of the house.

Here’s how it’s getting on:

First, here’s the pea shoots about 13 days after I cut the first set off (delicious, by the way). I had to throw out a couple of peas that’d gone bad, but nearly all the remaining peas have sent up a new shoot. Some sprout from the cut stems, others grow out of the pea itself. They should be ready to cut again before the weekend, and I hope they taste as good as the last lot. Read somewhere that you can get up to three crops out of one set of peas…

Next up, the cress. No need to mess about with cotton wool, just pop a folded-over bit of kitchen paper in a novelty eggcup, sprinkle with water and seeds and away you go. The double egg cup means you can have one lot ready and another lot sprouting at the same time.

And you can’t have cress without a bit of mustard… The seed collection I bought last month had mustard greens seeds in it – I’m sprouting a few here that seem to be enjoying the party. Will thin a few out to eat with the cress in a salad, and maybe keep some of the others to grow to full size outdoors in a pot. They make gorgeous curry.

My parsley has gone mad. It’s what I’d call ‘leggy’, which is fine for a ballet dancer but not a good thing for a plant, and it probably needs some more light and nutrients. The orange bobbles are granules of slow release plant food I found in the shed. At some point very soon I will have to write about how it went from being The Shed Of Doom to The Shed That Keeps On Giving, but not today.

The chilli seeds sprouted, and I kept the biggest, toughest looking one to grow on. It’s just thinking about stretching out its first pair of true leaves. Thinking about it, not quite doing it.

The spicy baby salad leaves are still doing the square root of eff all, so I’ll give them a dose of plant food tomorrow and hope for the best. Meanwhile, the mint and the purple basil are finally making an effort. That effort is so tiny you might miss it, but credit where credit’s due and all that…

That’s it from the windowsill this week. Next week there might be some new varieties growing away on there – I’ve found a couple of packets of bargain seeds on eBay and it’s time to break out the spare propagator.

What have you been growing?

Tags: grow chilli peppers indoors, grow salad indoors, grow your own pea shoots, growing food indoors, growing your own pea shoots, how to grow pea shoots, kitchen windowsill gardening, windowsill herbs, windowsill kitchen garden
Posted in Home & garden | 1 Comment »

Windowsill kitchen garden: Week 1

February 6th, 2010 by Penny Golightly

It’s been a week since I started the food garden on the inside windowsill in the kitchen. The weather has been mostly grey and overcast, but most of the plants are starting to make their presence felt. I’ve been gardening with whatever’s been lying around, some of which was reclaimed from the recycling bin, and the rest was mainly left behind by the people who lived here before us.

I forgot to say I’d planted some cress, which grew a full crop in 6 days. It strangely vanished, but unconfirmed reports suggest it got into an unlicensed bagel with some smoked cheese at around noon today. Think I’ll forget the compost next time and chuck it into the world’s silliest novelty egg cup with some soggy kitchen paper instead. Here is the last known photograph of batch 1:

Some of the pea sprouts are sprouting, using the method that can take up to 2 weeks:

I’ll be trying a different method next week that involves pre-soaking the peas and using a lot less compost. Fewer resources, less washing up, and allegedly higher percentage of germination. Sounds too good to be true but let’s wait and see.

The spicy purple basil and the green basil are just making themselves known, but they’re a bit shy so far. Hello purple basil, no need to be bashful…

The baby salad seeds have sprouted their first set of leaves, or at least germinated a little, but I won’t be able to tell what type of individual plants they are until they send out their second set. They’ll be more interesting in a few days, but here’s a baseline picture for the time being.

I would like a nice planter instead of this double-punnet contraption, but will wait to see whether the baby leaf experiment works first. At least it’s practical, and the drainage is just right.

As for the bigger pots of herbs, the mint’s still fast asleep under its duvet like a teenager who doesn’t want to go back to school after the end of the Christmas holidays. Come back next week and ask again about that one. The parsley, on the other hand, is doing me proud:

The chili pepper seeds by the radiator haven’t germinated yet, but they’re strange little plants and might take up to 6 weeks so there’s no point fretting about them. Apparently they don’t get out of bed for anything less than 70 degrees F, like finicky supermodels. If they don’t sprout I’ll just nip into a branch of Wahahca and ask if they have any of their little freebie match books of seeds to spare.

Anybody else out there got a windowsill food garden going right now, or planning to make one?

EDITED TO ADD: We now have a little online club for windowsill growers to swap tips, ideas and bargains. 100% free to use and non-profit. It’s right here on the Penny Golightly forum – anyone can read the comments, and it’s really easy to sign up if you’d like to join us and make your own posts and ask questions. Please feel free to have a look and join in.

Tags: grow your own pea shoots, growing food indoors, windowsill herbs, windowsill kitchen garden
Posted in Home & garden | No Comments »