Grow Your Own Micro-Greens on the Window-Sill

Disclosure.  This post is a review of a product I was sent for free. All opinions are my own.

I do love the idea of subscription boxes, particularly the element of surprise as to what will be in the next box. There is such a wide selection of themes that there is sure to be something for everyone. Recently I came across a new one – Silly Greens – the grow-your-own micro sized greens club and knew instantly that I just had to try this eco-friendly idea. So I was delighted to be selected to review one of their boxes for free. Plus when you page down, you’ll find details of a giveaway.

I’ve been dabbling with growing my own vegetables in the garden for a few years now, but had never thought of micro greens, even though they are so tasty. But I can remember one of my first introductions to growing plants as a young child was cress ‘heads’ in empty egg shells on the window sill. Sounds like time to return to my roots if you’ll pardon the pun.

Micro greens are ideal, as anyone can grow them indoors on their window sill all year round, even if you have no outdoor space. So the Silly Greens box fits easily through your letterbox and they have already got you started by sowing the seeds before sending it to you. Bet you’re wondering how that works, via the mail service, and possibly arriving upside down on your door mat. Well the seeds are not sown in soil, but on an Agar mat, which is an organic plant based jelly made from seaweed, which on the whole stickily keeps the seeds in place. No herbicides or pesticides involved and peat-free too. It doesn’t specifically say, but I believe this comes under the umbrella of hydroponic growing methods. Although I have to say the density of mine did vary somewhat across the trays, so I do wonder if they had moved a bit in transit. Since they had already germinated and sprouted, I wasn’t sure whether I should attempt to spread them out a bit, so I decided best to not touch. However the bunching didn’t seem to matter, apart from maybe the aesthetics of my photos.

The box has a label to warn that it contains perishable products, plus indicates which is the correct way up, so all I had to do on arrival was tear off the lid. There was a very useful booklet inside – The Green Touch, full of useful tips and facts along with a bit more information on the card about the varities included. So I discovered that it was recommended to keep the card covering them until their height pushes it off, that they don’t need the light initially. I also had to be careful with not much watering, as I do find with all gardening that I’m prone to either over or under watering. However Agar is a bonus in that regard, as it keeps the seeds hydrated without needing to be sprayed and the cover helps to maintain the humidity. I just passed that tip onto my Dad as he has been left in charge of making sure some carrot seeds that my niece planted on a sheet of damp kitchen roll don’t dry out whilst they are away on holiday.

Silly Greens have a wide range of micro greens listed on their website, but my box contained the following three crops – radish, rocket and turnip. Initially I knew which was which, due to the labelling on the card but I have to admit I got into a muddle, when I carried the individual trays to the sink for watering. I’m sure they didn’t realise how spot on their name choice would be in this regard, but apologies if I seem silly and green, talking about the  wrong crop now. The box was marked with the date of sowing, so you can easily keep track of progress. I decided it was time to start harvesting on day 10 as I think the ‘radish’ was starting to get a bit leggy. I cut all the ‘radish’ but only some of the other two, allowing them to continue to grow for longer.

Now hopefully you will appreciate some inspiration of how to serve these nutritious healthy sprouting seeds. Apart from a quick taste-test, my first harvest went in a salad I was making to take for my lunch at work. I don’t follow a particular recipe when making salad, but I usually do some prep in advance, for instance roasting some veggies in the oven, whilst cooking dinner. So this particular salad contained the following other ingredients along with the micro-greens.
Roasted sweet potato, parsnip and onion
Very slightly steamed broccoli (only because I prefer it that way to raw)
Shredded iceberg lettuce and red cabbage
Carrot, cucucmber and tomato
Several genererous spoonfuls of natural yoghurt

I harvested some more of the ‘rocket’ and ‘turnip’ micro-greens on day 14, this time to garnish a soup I was making. Who would like to guess the flavour from the image? I’ll tell you at the bottom of this blog post. The booklet indicates that most micro-greens are at their best at 3-4 inches tall. At this point, mine are probably still between 2-3 inches in height.

Once the crop is over, the Agar jelly and roots can go in either home compost or food waste. All other packaging is recyclable at home, plus the plastic trays can be washed and repurposed. However I decided to try and see if any seeds were still yet to germinate by popping them outside in a planter.

So each box of 3 greens currently costs £5 including postage and you can set up a subscription on a 1, 2, 4 or 6 weekly basis, depending how frequently you want your greens. It is very flexible too as you may pause or reschedule your delivery. That is such a bargain in my opinion and of course so fresh, as farmed micro-greens typically have such a short shelf life in comparison. Excellent value for money, sustainable and environmentally friendly too. Ideal as a gift too.

And I’m hosting a rafflecopter competition, courtesy of Silly Greens to give away a 6 month subscription of micro green boxes to one lucky winner. For clarity, this will be on a monthly basis, so the prize is 6 boxes in total.

a Rafflecopter giveaway – Please click on the link to enter.

And you may see my other giveaways here.

Now let me tell you the flavour of my soup. It is nettle and the microgreens certainly gave a delicious tasty boost to both my salad and soup. Tell me in the comments if you guessed the soup flavour correctly. Here is the link to my recipe.

I’d love to hear what are your favourite micro greens?

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Amaryllis comes again

I love this time of year when I start to see snowdrops, which to me represents the first sign that spring may be on the way. Although I have to say that so far we have been very lucky with such a mild winter. However the floods have been rather a nuisance, and with the current levels of the rivers, they are far from over.

Another indication of spring pending is my Amaryllis houseplant. I’ve had this for just over 2 years now. And each year it has amazed me how it appears to die and then regrows. Initially I had thought I’d killed it, as I’m not very good with plants. I seem to always over-water or under-water. Mostly only spider plants and aloe vera survive under my care.

However I cut the dead stems off and left it on the window sill, continuing to water occasionally and lo and behold, it grew again last year. I have to admit, with everything else going on in my life, I can’t remember if it re-flowered last year. Then once again it died down, but here it is starting to regrow once more.

My Amaryllis plant is growing again