How to Grow Sprouts (& Microgreens)

Countertop gardening for everyone!

Growing sprouts is an easy way to enjoy fresh greens year-round, right from your countertop. While they're expensive to buy at the store, they cost just pennies to grow yourself.

Sprouts are the perfect beginner “gardening” project for just about anyone, no matter where you live. You only need enough counter space for a jar, and you don’t even technically need a sunny window. Any old countertop will do.

There’s no soil to fuss with, and everything’s ready to eat before you know it.

Read More: How to Grow Sprouts

If you’re looking for slightly more of a challenge, but only slightly, you can try growing microgreens at home too. It’s very similar, but they require soil and you only eat the top half of the plant. It’s like growing greens, but in micro-sized…thus the name.

They’re ready to eat in just 2-3 weeks, depending on the type.

And again, all you need is a tiny bit of counter space. It’s literally square-inch gardening.

Read More: How to Grow Microgreens

Remembering back to early 2020, when everything was on lockdown, sprouts and microgreens were a huge part of our diet. Grocery stores around here couldn’t get deliveries, as the distributors were short drivers…so the really far-out rural areas with less demand just got skipped altogether.

For months, the shelves were just bare…and March and April aren’t exactly gardening weather here in Vermont. But we had our home canned goods, lots of freeze-dried fruit, stored flour for bread, and all the microgreens and sprouts we could eat. I actually made for really excellent meals, even months without the grocery store.

Microgreen and sprout seeds last for years, and they’re not a bad thing to keep on hand, just in case.

They’re also delicious for everyday use, and nothing can beat those fresh crunchy homegrown greens. (Grocery store versions don’t even compare, they’re not nearly so fresh, obviously.)

What are you harvesting, preserving, building, or exploring on your homestead this week? I’d love to hear about it!

Leave me a note in the comments…

(Comments only, please. Emails tend to get lost in my inbox, and as much as I’d love to get back to each and every one, my screen time is very limited…and things fall through the cracks, and emails get buried in my inbox. If you comment here, they’re all in one place, and it’s much easier to get back to every single one.)

Until Next Time,

Ashley at Practical Self Reliance