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Windowsill kitchen garden: Week 11

April 25th, 2010 by Penny Golightly

Spring has properly sprung on the windowsill, and the remaining plants seem very happy to be there. Perhaps now that most of them have been moved out to the greenhouse the others are getting more light and air. Last week the not-so-dwarf bean was flowering, this week it has baby beans on it:

Only a few so far, but let’s wait and see. On to the crazy cucumber plant, which is now sprouting lots of yellow flowers (which hopefully means heaps of mini cucumbers starting soon):

Both those plants are getting too big for the windowsill, unfortunately. I think I’m going to have to get them into bigger pots and get them used to the great outdoors over the next couple of weeks.

The chervil and the dill have already been outdoors a few times, going back into the greenhouse at night. We’ve been eating them too.

The tomato plants are looking kind of scruffy, but apparently that’s normal.

The experimental pot with spinach, land cress and rocket is now growing quite well – the land cress is probably the happiest:

We have some nearly-there spring onions too:

As for the rest of it, the cut-and-come-again salad leaves haven’t grown back (surprise!), the second crop of pea shoots have grown back (slowly but surely), and the basil and parsley are very happy. We ate all the alfalfa (nicer than I remembered) and radish shoots, but might do some more next week.

Are you growing any herbs or veggies indoors? How are they doing?

Tags: grow your own veg, growing herbs indoors, how to grow pea shoots, kitchen windowsill gardening, windowsill herbs, windowsill kitchen garden
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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
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Windowsill kitchen garden: Week 8

April 4th, 2010 by Penny Golightly

I have a little confession to make. There are no radishes to look at this week because, er, they were too tasty and the tops and stems ended up in a salad on Thursday, along with all the curly cress, microleaves/salad thinnings of the salad bowl lettuce and the lanky spicy salad baby leaves.

So I thought I’d better try sowing a few more salad/veg seeds, preferably things we haven’t seen yet. Here’s a pot with rocket at the top, spinach on the bottom left, and American land cress just starting to sprout on the bottom right:

I also had some free Little Gem and Serrano chili seeds that I stuck into a couple of pots but they’re not sprouting yet, so maybe next week… But for now, on with the show. Ta-daaaaa, more magic beans:

Thinning out the lettuce taught me a few things:

Lettuces don’t like being moved about
Lettuces don’t like being left in the sun
Lettuces don’t like being too warm

Here they are being a bit finnicky:

Started a new batch of pea shoots:

The mustard greens aren’t doing much, apart from losing their first set of leaves:

The spring onions look suspiciously like anaemic chives, so they have until next week to butch up:

I should probably pot on these overcrowded tomato seedlings:

The cayenne chili pepper is looking OK after being repotted:

I have high hopes for at least one of the cucumber plants surviving and growing well under glass:

The herbs – mint, chervil, dill and basil are all growing in the right direction now too:

I’ve swapped a few excess seeds for a load of alfalfa, but that hasn’t arrived yet. As soon as it does I’ll make some kind of seed/bean sprouter for the windowsill garden and see how that works out.

Are you growing any veg or herbs on your windowsill? If not, are you thinking about it? Any success stories so far this month?

Tags: grow herbs indoors, grow your own food indoors, growing food indoors, how to grow pea shoots, windowsill herbs, windowsill kitchen garden
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Windowsill kitchen garden: Week 6

March 18th, 2010 by Penny Golightly

Week six of trying to grow all kinds of tasty foods on an inside windowsill. Still trying to get as much deliciousness as possible for the least amount of outlay. What’s growing and what’s not?

The pea shoots have had their fish and chips. They’ve turned into mushy peas and aren’t going to give us a third crop. The first two rounds were great though, two gourmet bunches of pea shoots in one month from a tiny handful of peas and the smallest amount of soil-free compost. Will start another batch at the weekend and ditch the old ones:

The parsley is doing really well, so here’s the last pic of that:

Mint’s catching it up, finally, and the dill is putting out its first true leaves. Basil’s written off until April.

The spicy leaf mix is still fairly useless. Will probably sow another batch next month in a different container.

The iceberg lettuces got off to a good start but are a bit leggy now. Not sure if they need more sun or less. Any ideas?

The mustard greens seem really happy, and the salad bowl lettuces I sowed in the mini propagator four days ago are sprouting already.

So far so good with peppers, tomatoes, cucumbers, and the mini chili plant:

Finally, the radish tops were so delicious that I’m probably going to grow them all year round as microgreens. The variety I used was Cherry Belle, if you’d like to give it a go too. The flavour was sweet and mild, and you get fairly big fast-growing dark green leaves with red stems.

Have also sowed small pots of chervil and spring onions, but they are supposed to take a long time to germinate, so no pics of empty containers here. If there’s time at the weekend, will start off some land cress and baby leaf spinach too, to see how they get on.

So far the winners here are: pea shoots, common (curled) cress, mustard greens, parsley and radish tops. It might change as we go into Spring and Summer, who knows?

Are you growing any windowsill food? What are you having the most luck with so far?

Tags: grow your own food indoors, grow your own salad, growing food indoors, how to grow pea shoots, kitchen windowsill gardening, windowsill herbs, windowsill kitchen garden
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