Microgreens are a great way to increase your vitamin and mineral intake, they offer a nutrient dense vegetable that adds a great flavour to vegetables and meats, they also are a beautiful garnish. For these reasons, I recently invested in a hydroponic system, and I wanted to share what worked, needed to be changed and what was not necessary to the growth of these amazing plants.

I went with broccoli and radish seeds, due to their hardiness, fast growing, flavourful palette and that they can be grown year-round, great for the winter months where our diets lack copious amounts of vitamins and minerals.

DAY 1: the first task was to soak the seeds to give them the best chance of sprouting, I did 100 or so broccoli, and 50 radishes.

DAY 2: today, seeds started to open, I ate one at this stage and it tasted like a creamy lentil, at this stage they should be milk-white and unfolding.

DAY 3: the broccoli and radishes started to develop colour; this is when I placed them in the hydroponic system. I made sure to not have them too close to each other and filled the trays with water.

DAY 4: the stems on the radish started to grow and develop a purple tint, the broccoli remained white and green.

DAY 5: the stems had developed sufficient colour and were ready to be used as garnishes, another thing to keep in mind is that they develop a ‘spicey’ flavour the longer you let them grow.