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Microgreens are all the rage right now and for good reason, they’re healthy, grow quickly, and can be easily grown indoors. While microgreens can be used in a variety of ways, microgreen salads are fantastic for filling in the gaps that happen with seasonal eating.
Where to Get Microgreens
During the summer, it’s too hot for us to grow lettuce. If I’m being completely honest, my lettuce during the winter isn’t super great either since our winters are fairly warm which means our lettuce is often bitter.
Growing microgreens has helped fill in the lettuce gap that we often experience. Microgreens are grown exactly like micro herbs and can be grown quite easily in an indoor garden.
While you can buy microgreens in some grocery stores and farmer’s markets these days, they are fairly expensive. But when you grow them you just need seeds, a container, growing medium, and light.
Really, any plant that has edible leaves can be grown as microgreens but usually it’s those plants that have small seeds that are grown for microgreens. The most popular microgreen seeds are broccoli, amaranth, radish, cabbage, and mustard. But carrot, kale, and even peas and sunflowers are tasty as microgreens. MiGardener is a great place to seeds of all kinds, including microgreen seeds.
Making a Microgreen Salad
Microgreens are harvested when they’re just a couple of inches tall which means they’re going to be very tender. Because of this I like to thinly slice or chop any other salad ingredients so they don’t overpower the microgreens.
Grated carrots, beets, snap peas, onions, and chives all make great additions to microgreen salads. So do fermented foods such as lacto-fermented onions, cherry tomatoes, spicy beets, and cauliflower. Plus the brine from fermented vegetables can be used as a dressing.
I like to add some type of fruit to my salads, depending on what fruit is in season. In the spring it’s berries such as mulberries, blackberries, or strawberries. In the summer it’s passion fruit or even cantaloupe. During the fall, I usually use apples or pears. And in the winter, I add slices of citrus.
I also like to add a little protein and fat to my salads to make them a heartier. My favorite proteins are feta cheese, sunflower or pumpkin seeds, and garbanzo beans. I will usually add some pecans because we grow them and always have a bunch but other nuts such as walnut are good choices too. And, of course, some avocado.
I’ve found that when I have a variety of flavors in my salad, traditional salad dressings are really too much. Usually a little squirt of lemon, olive oil, and little brine from the fermented vegetables is all I need.
You could also thin some pesto with lemon juice and olive oil to make a dressing. Homemade jam that’s been thinned with lemon juice and oil also makes a good dressing.
As you can probably tell by now, no two microgreen salads are ever identical. Learning to use what you have and what’s available to you is part of the fun of growing your own food and eating seasonally.
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Yield: 1 Dinner Salad
Microgreens are a great way to bridge the salad gap that often happen with seasonal eating. This is more of a process than a recipe and you can use whatever fruits and vegetables you have to make a fantastic seasonal salad.
Prep Time10 minutes
Total Time10 minutes
Ingredients
- 1 cup Microgreens
- 1/2 cup grated carrots and/or beets
- 1/4 cup finely sliced snap or snow peas, radishes, or other vegetables
- 1/2 cup finely chopped fruit - apples, pear, berries, or oranges
- 1/4 cup sliced tomatoes
- 1/4 cup feta
- 1/4 cup sunflower or pumpkin seeds
- Oil and vinegar for dressing
Instructions
- Wash the microgreens and use a salad spinner to dry them.
- Put the microgreens on a dinner plate.
- Wash all the the vegetables and fruits and finely chop or slice them.
- Put the other fruits and vegetables on the microgreens.
- Add the feta and seeds.
- Add some oil and vinegar for a dressing.
