Grow plants for free from pips and peelings!
Making brand new plants from leftover scraps is a brilliant activity that turns waste into plants and food. It costs very little and all you need is a sunny windowsill and some recycled plastic trays. We had a lot of fun with this and it is amazing how plants respond to being asked to grow!
1.Cabbages/Pak Choi/ Lettuce/Radish/Celery
Place the cut base of your cabbage/ cauli/radish etc in a shallow bowl or saucer with some water. Keep the base wet, and change the water every few days. In less than a week, you’ll see new leaves appear. Harvest the leaves as you need them – they’re a great addition to stir-fries or salads.
2. Avocado seeds
These large seeds germinate readily and make interesting houseplants. Dry and pierce a cleaned seed with three or four cocktail sticks, about halfway up. Fill a jam jar to just below the rim with water. Now rest the sticks on the top, so the rounded seed bottom is suspended in water. Keep it topped up so the base of the seed remains wet. Eventually, the seed will split as roots and shoots emerge (this can take up to eight weeks). Once the plant has several leaves, remove the sticks and plant it half-buried in a pot of peat-free compost. Remember to water regularly.
3. Carrot tops
These produce leaves rather like parsley for garnishing dishes or nibbling as a healthy snack. If the carrot already has leaves, trim them off. Next, remove the top 2-3cm of your carrot. Plant this shallowly (top uppermost) in a pot of peat-free compost or you can sit it in a shallow dish of water on the windowsill and let the tops sprout. Change the water every few days.
4.Pineapple Plant
Yes, you can grow a pineapple plant (a type of bromeliad) from the leafy fruit top. With enough warmth and light it can even bear fruit. Remove the top leafy growth from your pineapple, cutting through the fruit about 2-3cm below where the leaves join it. Leave to dry on a plate for 24 hours, then plant the fleshy base in peat-free compost. Leaf tips may go brown while roots are developing, but these can be trimmed off. Grow on a warm, sunny windowsill.
5. Citrus Fruit
Orange, lemon, lime and grapefruit pips will grow to become small evergreen bushes. Peel and remove seeds from the fruit segments. Sow straight away in pots of peat-free compost around 1cm deep. Moisten the soil and cover with a clear plastic bag, keep the pot in a warm place. When seedlings germinate, move the container to a sunny spot and remove the plastic bag. Once they have a few pairs of leaves, transplant to larger pots. Keep them on a sunny windowsill or in a conservatory.
6.Pea Shoots
Soak a handful of dried peas from the supermarket for a couple of hours. Then sow them into compost in a shallow tray or into toilet roll inner tubes. Keep them moist but not wet. Leave them on a sunny windowsill and the seeds should start to germinate in about a week. Let them grow to about 10cm tall then snip them and use them in salads …. Delicious…or if it is the Spring plant them out in the garden for a proper pea crop. Sow another batch every 2 weeks to get a continual supply.
7. Spring Onions
Trim the base off the onions, plant them into a shallow tray with drainage holes in it and the onions will regrow. If you keep this up you might never need to buy spring onions again!
8. Leeks
Trim the base and put it in a shallow tray of water on the windowsill, change the water every few days. The leek will soon start to sprout and can be potted up and grow on, you could also plant it out in the garden if it is the right season.
Further Reading:
https://www.farmersalmanac.com/regrow-vegetables-from-kitchen-scraps
https://blog.themodernmilkman.co.uk/how-to-grow-veg-from-scraps/
Book: Grow your Groceries by Simon Akeroyd
