Growing micro herbs is easy and it’s just like growing microgreens, only you’re growing herb seeds instead of micro vegetables. Micro herbs are nutritious, beautiful, and tasty. One thing I love about micro herbs is how pretty and frilly many of them are.
Micro Herbs List
You can grow any herb and harvest at micro size. They taste similar to the larger herbs, but tend to be milder in taste and texture.
- Basil: Green & Purple basil make a super tasty micro herb. You can also use unique basil types like cinnamon basil, licorice basil or lemon. Dry your basil to use it over longer periods of time.
- Chervil: Frilly leaves offering a mild sweet anise flavor.
- Dill: Feathery leaves, mild dill flavor.
- Cilantro: Cilantro flavor with frilly leaves.
- Sorrel: Bright lemon flavor, certain varieties have a pretty red vein. This is a bitter green when fully grown but much better as a micro.
- Fennel: Anise flavor, pretty frilly leaves.
- Cress: A superfood & powerhouse for nutrition
- Celery: Mild celery flavor. This was the first microgreen I grew as a herb for flavor.
- Nasturtiums: I know nasturtiums are edible flowers, so I was delighted to find out you can grow them as micro greens that have a slight peppery flavor.
- Shiso: Tasting like a mix of spearmint, anise, basil, cumin & cinnamon, this is a herb that’s gaining in popularity for its unique & complex flavor.
How to Grow Micro Herbs
- Fill a seeding tray with soil, make sure you have one that has drainage holes and place it inside another seeding tray that is solid without the drainage.
- Fill the tray up with seed starter or sterilized soil. I also add worm castings for a seedling nutrient boost.
- Lightly scatter your seeds in the soil and barely cover the seeds with more soil. I place the trays under our grow lights to warm up the soil before sowing.
- Water lightly and check on them daily. Many people make the mistake of overwatering seedlings so be sure the soil is damp but not too dry or wet.
- Harvest after about 1-3 weeks! Start harvesting when the very first leaves (cotyledons) appear or wait until the first true leaves grow out, on average around 1 1/2 -2 inches, but before they start looking leggy or stunted
I have fenugreek sprouts growing in the greenhouse. But I don’t know how to use them in a yummy way. All these microsprouts, what do you do with them?