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ast, fun to grow and packed with flavor and nutrition, tender young microgreens can go from seed to table in as little as a week. Close cous- ins to edible sprouts, microgreens are grown in potting soil or seed-starting mixes instead of plain water. They cus- tomarily grow beyond the sprout stage until they have produced a true leaf or two. After that, harvesting is a simple matter of snipping off fresh greens. “You don’t need a green thumb to


grow microgreens, only patience and per- sistence,” says Mark Mathew Braunstein, in Old Saybrook, Connecticut, author of Microgreen Garden. Even first-timers can expect good results. For example, the thin shoots grown from popcorn taste like a more vibrant form of sweet corn, and pea shoots work well in wraps, salads and virtually any Asian dish. Like high-fiber wheatgrass, “Mi- crogreens are great for juicing, either by themselves or mixed with other veggies,” says Rita Galchus (aka Sprout Lady Rita), proprietor of The Sprout House, in Lake Katrine, New York, which sells organic seeds for micro- greens and sprouts. “You can add a handful of microgreens to a smoothie to ramp up the nutrition without changing its taste or texture,” she notes.


36 Long Island Edition www.NaturalAwakeningsLI.com


Easy-Grow Microgreens Are Big on Nutrition by Barbara Pleasant


Good Picks The seeds of dozens of plants from alfalfa to wheat can be grown as micro- greens. If seeking to maximize nutri- tion, put red cabbage and cilantro on the planting list. Scientists at the U.S. Department of Agriculture Food Qual- ity Laboratory, in Beltsville, Maryland, tested the nutritional properties of 25 microgreens; red cabbage, cilantro, gar- net amaranth and green daikon radish had the highest concentrations of vita- min C, carotenoids, and vitamins K and E, respectively. Microgreens generally provide three times as much nutrition per weight as the same food eaten in its mature state. “People underestimate the intense


flavor of microgreens and might try planting mustard greens or radish varieties even if they don’t like spicy flavors,” say Elizabeth Millard, an organic farmer in Northfield, Minnesota, and author of Indoor Kitchen Gardening. For beginners, large seeds that sprout quickly such as sunflowers, buckwheat and snow peas are good choices because they produce big, robust sprouts with mild flavor. Many people also grow microgreens for their pets. “Cats tend to prefer mild, sweet-tasting microgreens such as red


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