The other evening, as I was preparing dinner, I cut up a tomato and realized I could use the seeds from it to add to my garden. Maybe this isn’t a new concept for you, but I hadn’t thought of it before. Now I do know that I can eat what I grow and that a farmer raised all the fruits and vegetables I buy at the grocery store and farmers markets. But I just hadn’t thought about the reverse – we can start or add to our garden from the fruits and vegetables in our fridge!
So now that I had this revelation, I needed to do some research. I watched numerous videos, and while they were full of information, they were long and very in-depth. A lot of science, which is fine, but I just wanted some basic knowledge of how to take seeds from plants and then plant them in my garden.
This year, I decided to try growing cantaloupe in my garden. While we can buy cantaloupe and other melons year round in grocery stores here in Arizona, right now the melon selection is imported from outside the US. But it is the perfect time to plant the seeds and have melons to enjoy later this summer.
Last week, I planted the seeds that I had purchased and they are starting to sprout. I, also, happen to have just bought a cantaloupe from the grocery store. Why don’t we cut it open and compare the seeds?
The seeds on the left are left over from the packet I bought. The ones on the right are from the cantaloupe that I just cut open. Now, a few differences to note: the seeds from the packet are an heirloom variety and the fresh seeds are not and need to be cleaned before they can be planted. Even though they will produce different varieties of cantaloupe, the seeds look the same. My only question is to plant more cantaloupe seeds (a little go a long way) or should I save these seeds for next year? You have that option, as well, if you already have started a garden or if you aren’t ready to this year, you can start saving seeds for next year.
I will give a full update soon on what I planted in my garden and how it is all doing. In the meantime, you can check out our Instagram to see real time glimpses of my garden.
Have you tried a garden? Did you know you can grow herbs, fruits, and vegetables in containers? You really don’t need much room to grow your own food and in this time of quarantine it might be good idea to try. If you have kids at home, this is a good way to teach some of those science lessons and get them to increase their enjoyment of vegetables ~ when they grow them, they are more likely to try them!
Some (but not all) plants that are easy to start from items in your fridge include:
Melons, tomatoes, peppers, squash
Others, like celery, lettuce, and avocado, take a little work before they can be planted.
So, what do you have in your fridge that you can start a garden with this weekend? If you get a chance to try this, let us know how it turned out. Please share your photos of your gardens, we would love to see them.
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