How to use, Eat & Enjoy Microgreens

Before I share what's the best ways to enjoy your produce and the best Microgreens recipes, let's start with what to avoid! I suggest NOT to do the following:

• Storing: I’m showing you how to get the freshest Vegs here, and cut them as needed just before serving! Simply avoid cutting them ahead for storing in the fridge to avoid losing nutrients.

• Boiling: Microgreens are very fragile and will leach all nutrients – enjoy Microgreens raw instead!

• Freezing: Some vitamins don’t survive freezing; again just enjoy Microgreens fresh!

• Juicing for later: While it’s a good addition to your shakes, nutrients loss happens very quickly so if you do juice your Microgreens, make sure to consume immediately and not leave in the fridge.

Now you’ve produced Microgreens, it’s time to enjoy them!

• How do you eat microgreens?
  I love eating them raw, straight on the plate, either virgin or with olive oil, balsamic or cider vinegar.

• How do you prepare Microgreens?
  There are many other uses for Microgreens: in wraps, mixed in salads, in your sandwich, with sushi, soups; juiced or added to your smoothies and nutritional shakes; or sprinkled on pizzas, meat dishes, omelets (my favourite!)

And they bring such colours to your plate!

There is some science in determining how much of anything you should eat:

• In the US, that’s the National Institutes of Health’s Nutrient Recommendation: Dietary Reference Intake

• In the UK, that’s the Public Health England’s Government Dietary Recommendations

Microgreens are full of micronutrients, including vitamins and minerals that could have some negative effects if taken beyond the recommended limits.

However, you’d need to way more Microgreens than what you are likely to produce each day to reach those levels, so fear not!

As per USDA, you should be eating 5 to 13 servings of Fruits & Vegs each day – how does that compare with your intake?

As always, eating a healthy, balanced diet is important so I recommend you do the following:

• Rotate Microgreens varieties,

• Do eat full sized mature Vegs as well (it will give you the fibre and proteins needed),

• Do add Microgreens in every meal, it will help close the nutrients gap that affects 2 billions of us!

I’ve created the Ultimate List of Microgreens you can grow, check it out!

A good rule to remember is that you should not eat plants you wouldn’t eat when mature – such as tomatoes, part of nightshade family and poisonous!

You can – not necessarily the best but it's better than none!Another way of consuming your Microgreens – and in particular when your medical condition requires it (cancer patients for example) – you’ll want and need to absorb significant amount nutrients in quantities that you couldn’t process and digest normally, so Juicing is not only for super tasty drinks but it will also remove all bulk and fibre from fruits & Vegs – (not much in Microgreens) for easier digestion, yet retaining all nutrients and enzymes in particular. Learn more about the best way of juicing not just for taste but for your health!

Any of the Microgreens you eat can be juiced as well and mixed with fruits & Vegs, so another reason to grow as much Microgreens as possible!

As mentioned in what NOT to do with Microgreens, I don’t recommend cooking them.

They are fragile little plants, which will lose all their goodness in no time if cooked.

So I’d recommend simply adding them on the plate when serving. If you insist in cooking them, at the very last moment you may add radish Microgreens in stir fry for example.

See where I get inspirations from for Microgreens recipes:

• Some great recipes for Microgreens here from BootStratp Farmer!

• Innovative use of Microgreens and other Vegs & Plants by Koppert Cress – must check it out

• A great collection of recipes on Hamama

• Dean & Jayne's recipes at the Greensted regenerative project

• Samira's Alpha Foodie and her Microgreens recipes

• For vibrant Indian recipes inspiration, check out:

  • Chef Sanjeev Kapoor‘s recipes (12,000+!!!

  • Nitha Kitchen's recipes

  • Jyoti Bherani‘s recipes

• From other great blogs:

  • 25 healthy cooking recipes with Microgreens

  • Egg white omelette with avocado, goat cheese, and Microgreens

  • 12 Microgreen Recipes Packed With Macro Flavor

  • 10 anti-aging smoothies with Microgreeens

As mentioned in what NOT to do with Microgreens, please don’t freeze them as they are very fragile plants and will lose their nutrients too quickly.

If you must insist, maybe try to dry the Microgreens, crush them to powder and freeze that Microgreens powder instead.

If you are wondering what to do with the waste produce from your Microgreens, I’d recommend these 3 options:

• Want to improve the taste and nutrient content of eggs produced by your chickens? You could simply lay on the ground in your chicken enclosure the spent coco fibre and Microgreens cut stems and roots, they’ll love scratching the mats and picking any remaining seeds and eat the tasty Vegs. They love particular “fodder” (greens grown for chickens!) such as Kale, Lettuce, Spinach, Chard, etc. See this article about what else they’ll love!

• Worm Compost food: If you don’t have chickens, you can add the spent coco fibre mats, roots & cut stems to your worm compost bin; it will degrade in no time!

• Can you compost Microgreens? Alternatively, you can simply add the spent mats to your compost pile – it will take a bit longer to compost but it will!

It depends:

• At home: yes no problem! Or you can put it in your Worm Farm too.

• If you are commercially growing Vegs, in the US you cannot reuse your soil, peat moss, coco coir, etc for Microgreens unless you know how to professionally compost it. You also cannot compost Microgreens spent soil for the same reasons.

Can you reuse Microgreen soil? You could also use the spent root coco fibre mats as mulch to retain moisture and release nutrients to the plants. As it decomposes, it will attract worms and develop more bacterias that will be beneficial for your plants.

Another twist with “Companion mulching”: in some cases, the scents for example from Radish helps protect Squash plants from beetles!