Repurpose Your Kitchen Scraps to Plants
7 Plants You Can Regrow From Kitchen Scraps.
The pandemic has turned me into a plant mum. I love watching my plants thrive and brighten my little flat in London. In my obsession to acquire more and more plants, I began exploring turning my kitchen scraps into beautiful plants. Here are my top picks:
1. Pineapple
The head of a pineapple can be used to regrow your own pineapple plants. However, I wouldn’t hold your breath for getting fresh pineapples immediately — pineapple plants need 2–3 years of maturing before flowering and fruiting can take place.
All you need to get started is a ripe pineapple with healthy-looking leaves. The top can be removed by twisting it off the pineapple. This is actually the best method as it will allow you to get the right parts for regrowth. For optimal rooting, peel the bottom leaves off the base and place the pineapple head in a glass of water. After a couple of days, buds and roots should begin to sprout and before you know it you’ll be the proud owner of a pineapple plant.
2. Ginger
Ginger plants have lovely long stalks and big leaves. The best part of these plants? Many of the ginger flowers are very fragrant giving your home a nice smell.
When planting ginger, the biggest concern is rot. Soak your ginger in water overnight then put it in soil. Avoid watering further as too much water will lead to rot. After a couple of weeks, you should see the buds of the ginger root start to sprout. You can harvest your ginger from 4 months after sprouting.
3. Tumeric
Turmeric has large green leaves and grows 3 or more feet tall. As the plant matures each stem sends up a spike of greenish-white and occasionally pink flowers. Like ginger, turmeric thrives in warm, humid conditions and well-drained, neutral soil. Your turmeric is ready to harvest when the leaves and stem start to turn brown and dry, about seven to 10 months after planting.
4. Carrots
Carrot tops are one of the easiest houseplants to grow and their fern-like foliage and white lacy flowers make for a beautiful plant. However, be warned that the carrot tops won’t produce carrots — these are taproots and once removed from the plant, they can’t regrow.
To grow this carrot houseplant, stick a toothpick into either side of the carrot stump and balance on top of a glass of water. Eventually, roots should sprout. Alternatively, lay several layers of newspaper soaked with water and set your carrot tops on the paper. Keep the paper wet to see the roots start to spread.
5. Lemon
Lemon plants make for cute indoor trees, and hey who doesn’t love making lemonade? To get started, collect lemon seeds and propagate them by leaving them to soak in a wet paper towel. After the roots start to sprout transfer to the soil and place in a warm environment.
6. Basil
My partner has been trying to grow a herb garden and found basil a surprisingly difficult plant to grow. The most successful method he found was using a water propagation method.
The water propagation method involves cutting basil stems and removing the lower leaves. The stems are then placed in water and roots start to sprout all along the stem. To speed up the rooting process, I would suggest adding a couple of drops of plant feeder such as BabyBio.
7. Celery
You might see a bit of a theme emerging here: place plant scraps in water, root, soil, repeat. For celery, use the end of the plant to get the best results. After a few days, you should start seeing small leaves emerging from the very center of the top. In about a week, you may see small stalks and leaves, and tiny roots emerging around the base. The cut stalks around the outer base may start deteriorating and turning brown. Don’t panic — this is normal. But if you leave the celery in water for too long, the outer stalks will get serious rot, so it’s best to plant the celery in a pot before that happens.
