Grow your own herbs on the windowsill
A sunny sill and a few small pots are all it takes to snip fresh basil, mint and parsley as you cook — ending the cycle of half-used plastic packs going slimy in the fridge.
Fresh herbs are one of the quietest sources of food and plastic waste in the kitchen. A recipe asks for a tablespoon of basil, you buy a whole plastic-wrapped pack, use a fraction, and the rest turns to slime at the back of the fridge a few days later. A couple of pots on the windowsill flip that completely: you snip exactly what a dish needs, the plant keeps growing, and the plastic pack never enters the equation.
It’s also genuinely forgiving, which makes it a lovely first step into growing your own food. Herbs are happy in small pots, ask only for decent light, a drink when the compost dries out, and the occasional trim — and regular snipping actually makes them grow back bushier. There’s no garden, no patience for a full season, and no real skill required to get going.
The honest nuance is light and those tempting supermarket “living herb” pots. Most herbs sulk in a gloomy north-facing window, so give them the brightest sill you have. And the cheap living pots are sown so densely that the seedlings strangle each other within a week — the fix is to split the clump into a couple of roomier pots the day you get it home. Do that, and a €1.50 impulse buy becomes months of fresh flavour on tap.
How to do it
- Pick a bright sill — most herbs want roughly six hours of light, so a south- or west-facing window is ideal; a kitchen one keeps them within snipping reach.
- Start with easy, useful herbs: basil, mint, parsley, chives and thyme all do well indoors. Mint is happiest in its own pot, as it bullies anything it shares with.
- Use small pots with drainage holes and a saucer, filled with peat-free compost; rescue and re-pot a supermarket living-herb pot straight away, as those are sown far too densely to last.
- Water when the top of the compost feels dry — little and often beats a weekly drowning, and tip away any water left sitting in the saucer.
- Harvest by pinching from the top regularly, never stripping a plant bare; frequent snipping makes herbs bushier rather than leggy.
- Feed with a weak organic liquid feed every couple of weeks in the growing season, and turn the pots now and then so they don't lean to the light.
Pro tips & pitfalls
- That €1.50 supermarket basil is dozens of seedlings crammed into one pot fighting to the death — split it into two or three clumps and re-pot, and it lives for months instead of a week.
- Pinch out flower buds as they appear on basil and the like: once a herb flowers it puts its energy into seed and the leaves turn bitter.
What it's good for
Good for the planet
- Cuts waste Snipping only what you need ends the half-used supermarket pack that wilts to slime in the fridge — a major source of household food waste.
- Beats plastic No more single-use plastic herb sleeves and trays; one re-used pot replaces a steady stream of them.
Good for you
- Saves money A few plants give months of leaves for the price of one or two plastic packs, which sell for €2–3 each and are mostly thrown away.
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