13) How to grow edible plants indoors in the colder months.

By Sindy Wakeham

You can't grow food plants during the winter in the UK, can you?  

Yes, you can! 

You've probably got to have all sorts of expensive equipment and lots of space to compensate for the climate. 

NO. You can start right where you are and with what you might already have. 

In this blog, we will see just how simple and affordable it can be. You will see how you can still grow nutritionally dense food indoors. Of course you could also go all in and get technical if you want. You have the choice. I like to keep it simple myself.

It takes some clever hacks, maybe technology (not necessary) and remembering the four general rules. Rethink what you call veggies and change your ideas about gardening indoors, and how to grow vegetables to harvest during the winter and early spring. 

How Can You Grow Food Indoors?

Greenhouses, summerhouses, conservatories and windowsills all make very good spaces for growing plants for harvest during the colder months that you wouldn't be growing outside. But...and there's a big but (not mine), we'll stick with a simpler and easier method without any complicated stuff. 

For 'indoors' in an outside space like greenhouses and polytunnels, you need to generate some heat if you live in a colder climate with hot beds or by greenhouse heaters but I'm not a fan. They use paraffin which produces some harmful toxins. It was suggested here, that it's safer to use Kerosene (a low-sulphur form of paraffin). I prefer the 'hotbed' method. You could bubble wrap the structure inside and ensure good ventilation. That's if you HAVE a greenhouse, pollytunnel or the like. I'm not focusing on greenhouses in this blog.

Most people, including myself, DON'T have that kind of protected structure and if we are lucky, a conservatory but mostly, the windowsill is all we have indoors. That, or you could use a grow tower. More on that later. 

Indoors inside the home is where I like to grow my winter edible plants. After all, when it's freezing outside I don't want to be outside, most times. Growing food indoors during the colder months is easier than you think. Depending on what you want to grow, you DON'T need expensive equipment and you CAN use a windowsill. So how do we do that?   

Let's keep this simple. You won't be growing carrots and cabbages in the house but there are so many other things and ways you can grow in your  house. When it comes to growing indoors, the easiest and simplest plants are sprouted seeds and micro-greens and herbs. If that sounds complicated before I even give you any details, hold your horses! 

Easiest and Simplest Plants for Indoor Edible Harvests

Sprouted seeds is an obvious choice. As seeds germinate, they become more digestible and are at the peak of their nutrient density for their size, having all the nutrients in them to become an adult plant. If you sprout even a teaspoon of seeds, you'll begetting just as many nutrients as you would in a whole bunch of adult plants that you might not be able to eat in that quantity. So sprouted seeds are mega-powerhouses of nutrition. 

They don't take up as much space as the plants need outdoors to grow to maturity. You can use a jam jar and from a teaspoon full of seeds, end up with a full jar of sprouts. Some seeds need only a plate and paper towel to sprout but that leads me to micro-greens, as in the video above.

Micro-greens are sprouted seeds left just a little longer to begin to form their first few leaves and harvested as baby greens. Still with all the nutrients of the sprouted seeds but with the added benefit of chlorophyl. Chlorophyl protects from toxins and carcinogens and has numerous other health benefits. 

Sprouted seeds and micro-greens also contain vital enzymes, as do all living things but as I said before, in germinated seeds in concentrated form. These enzymes control almost every function in our bodies from supporting and boosting our immune systems to digestion and elimination of toxins. 

The problem is, they are temperature sensitive so sprouts and micro-greens are best eaten raw for their full benefits. But this isn't a blog about nutrition! It's about growing food indoors in the winter. I simply wanted to emphasize why it was such a great idea to do so. The foods we store or buy in the supermarkets might not be as nutrient dense as those just harvested right there in your own home.

Other than sprouts and micro-greens, what else can we grow indoors?

Herbs

You already know you CAN buy potted living herbs in supermarkets but they are already at their peak and grown densely in a small pot so plants are more easily stressed and die quicker. Much better to grow your own so you can control how many seeds go into a pot and give the plants more space, nutrients and air to grow healthily and last longer.  

Some of my favourite herbs to keep indoors during winter are chives, mint (which are so easy to propagate from cuttings!), thyme, catnip (for medicinal tea), and dill. Other herbs I simply use dried and stored from earlier in the year or have growing outside all year round  like bay and sage. 

Other Plants

Some, like the cut 'n come again lettuces can be grown in pots on a windowsill but might need more feeding and extra light so keep them on a south facing windowsill if you have one and keep turning it around every day as it grows toward the light. I'll be experimenting with grow lights in the near future so keep popping in at my YouTube channel here for updates.

4 General Rules before we get into the details.

1. Water other than the initial soaking and then watering the tray for microgreens, you only need to rinse or spray sprouts and greens once germinated.
2. Light is even more important than water as you'll be growing indoors so natural window light or grow lights may be needed for up to 14 hours a day.  
3. Temperature is important too. lights and direct south facing window light will help but keep a heat mat or something similar on the windowsill or grow station. If you don't have one, take the plants off the windowsill at night and put them back in the morning. Temperatures against windows drop at night.
4. You will need bought sterile soil (or microwave your own but I hate the idea of killing off soil organisms. It's important to use sterile soil to avoid weeds, diseases and pests that are naturally in the soil. If using a hydroponics system, you don't need soil at all and I have seeds growing on wet paper towel. they won't need feeding (except for plants other than sprouts or microgreens) because they will be harvested within days to just a few weeks. 

Equipment

My favourite vessel for growing sprouted seeds is a jam jar. Just a teaspoon of seeds sprouted can fill a whole jar. I use a piece of net cloth (old net curtains or cut up fabric vegetable bags do well), and hair bands to hold the net onto the jar. 

You could use bought mason jar draining lids to fit into the screw top rings but I found mine rusted. nothing wrong with cloth. You could also use a sprouting tray. I have one but have also seen clay stacking sprout trays. 

For microgreens  I have been using any bowl, dish, plate that can hold seeds on wet paper towel and be sprayed wet to keep moist. I turn it back to front every day to get to the light as it grows. 

You could use a regular watering tray with gravel or sand, another seed tray on top and some sterile compost and sand mix about 2cm deep. Wet it and sprinkle seeds on the surface and sprinkle more light compost only just enough to barely cover the seeds. spray the surface. Place another seed tray on top. The seeds don't need sunlight until they start to sprout. Check daily and spray to keep the surface moist. 

Once sprouted, remove the top tray and keep it in as much light as possible, turning back to front daily. harvest with scissors once about 4 to 8cm tall and keep spraying to allow slower seeds to grow.  

There are as I've mentioned before, grow towers that can be used indoors. I do love them but wow, they are so expensive. Besides the cost, they require space. and need electricity for running the grow lights and for the hydroponics tower for the pump as well that circulates the sprayed water down the central tube onto the roots. People who have used those, said they aren't very costly on energy. I've not use one so cannot claim that.

I have seen people who have used the 5' tall mini greenhouses with a plastic cover. Much mor affordable and you can rig your own lights. That too will be in my experiments soon. So stay tuned.  

No Soil Withdrawal Symptoms For Winter!

You can get as simple or as complicated, affordable or not, technical or basic as you like. There are so many ways to grow food indoors for the winter that you really are spoilt for choice. 

There's only one downside for me and that's putting Christmas decorations up around my plants. Tough choice! Most people would prefer just to buy their fresh foods from stores or use the harvests they stored from the garden but as I mentioned at the beginning, sprouting and microgreens have a greater nutrient and health power you won't find in your usual foods so well worth it but there's one other reason I love to grow [lants, food or otherwise and winter can be so long!

By mid November every year, I tend to get 'withdrawal' symptoms from not being able to get out into the garden and getting my hands in the soil and on the plants. You know what I mean if you are an outdoors garden type. I am. 

Growing indoors brings me the joy, satisfaction and grounding that I would normally feel in lack of for the colder  months of the year. Getting your hands on plants as you tend them does more for your general health than simply buying your microgreens and sprouts. Try it.

I would love to hear about your experiences with growing food indoors or if you haven't yet, will you? Is there anything I haven't covered, you would like me to? 

Happy indoor gardening to you all for the winter!

Next time, Using Fresh and Stored Foods From the Garden.