How to: Regrow Supermarket Herbs at Home 🍃

Welcome Friends ! 

Today I am going to show you a step-by-step of how I grow my store-bought herbs in my kitchen, and how to make them last for ages. If you enjoy cooking like me, you'd know how wonderfully herbs can help flavour up dishes by adding extra fragrance and texture. However, fresh herbs can be very expensive to buy and difficult to find out-of season. They also don't tend to last very long neither, even when refrigerated.

Just about two months ago, I went to a local fruit and vegetable store, and found Thai basil there. I love Thai food, but some ingredients can be very rare to come across. I always find myself having to settle for frozen ingredients or the alternatives. For example, when I used to make Pad Krapao (Thai basil stir fried), I would just use Italian basil instead of Thai basil. It does the job, but definitely doesn't give the same authentic flavour. When I saw those Thai basil plants sitting on the shelf, begging me to take them home. I decided, no more wasting money on supermarket herbs that will only last me a few day, and said to myself "I'm just going to grow my own herb garden !" This way, I will always have freshly picked herbs for all my home cooked meals.

Here are what you will need:

1. Thai Basil Living Plants (Or any other living herb plants you like) - $3.99 
2. Potting Mix - $9
3. Small Pots - $5.98
4. Saucers - Free (From recycled material) 

Once you have everything ready, let's get to work ! 

According to LaidBackGardener, "Supermarket herbs are sold very densely packed into their pots. Most are just young seedlings only a few weeks old and would look wimpy on their own, so producers jam them at a rate of 10 to 20 per pot. That gives a fuller, more mature looking pot, but one that is way too crowded! Even under ideal conditions, the seedlings would soon be struggling for survival".  The first thing you will need to do is to pick out the living herb plants you want to regrow. The fresher they are, the more they are likely to survive, so make sure you pick out the healthiest looking one from the supermarket. I would suggest having everything else ready before you go get the herb, as you don't want to wait too long to plant them. 

Photo Credit: Food To Love

If you have never bought living herb plants from supermarket before, they are usually located in the produce section on their own self-standing shelves. Most plants each comes in a small pot with plastic packaging around it. 

• Once you have your plant of choice on hand, first thing is to divide them into smaller portion, leaving around 2-4 healthy plants per pot. Once divided, you can get up to 7-10 plant pots from an average pot of supermarket herb plants. If you don't want to fill your kitchen up with 10 of them same herbs, you can keep 3-4 divided portion and use up the rest instead. Unfortunately, I forgot to take a photo of this step for you guys, but not to worry. I include an example picture I found online for you below.

Photo Credit: Garden Betty

• Now you will have to get the pots ready. I used 0.6L Maxi Pot, they come in a pack of 20, and are slightly bigger than the supermarket pot which the plants originally came in. if you are looking for a more sustainable way, I'd recommend using Paper Pots. These are even cheaper than the plastic pots I got. They are biodegradable which means they can easily be planted straight into the ground, giving you both options of indoor and outdoor gardening. 

Left: Grow-it Maxi Pots / Right: Jiffy Easi Grow Pots

• I filled each pot with a quarter of potting mix (All purpose potting mix works wonder, but I accidentally bought outdoor tub mix and it works just fine as well), just enough to cover the bottom. Then I placed the plants in the centre of the pot, while filling it up 3/4 way full with potting mix. To add a little more support, I add some more potting mix on the top layer and lightly compacted around the bottom of the plants. 

* P.S. 15 Litres of potting mix will last you for ages !

Daltons All purpose Potting Mix from The Warehouse

Lightly compacted bottom of the plant(s) with potting mix to increase stability

• Repeat the same process with the rest of the plants and Ta Da, you are done !

Now the only thing you have to worry about is to keep them alive. It's very simple, you just need to water them once a day, and make sure they are placed in a spot with enough sunlight. I put them on my kitchen bench next to a big ranch slider, so they get to soak up the sun all day. It pays to put a saucer underneath each pot to avoid creating mess when you water them, especially if you were to keep them inside. I have an old Wardrobe Storage Shoe Rack that has been sitting in my garage for awhile, so I took one of the shelf board out and put the pot plants over it. It has nice laminate finish and looks great on top of my kitchen bench, it also really easy to wipe down when I spill some water on it. Grate way to recycle right ? If you don't want to buy a saucer for each of your plants, getting a planter through is not a bad idea neither.

There you go my friends, that's how I regrow store-bought herbs at home. It's so easy and doesn't cost a lot at all. Trust me, from now you will save so much money from having to buy more herbs every time you need it. I hope you give it a try and don't forget to let me know how it goes. All feedbacks, recommendations, and questions are welcomed ! Have a lovely week, and I will see you all next time

XOXO