Regrow vegetable scraps

by Anne-Marie Bonneau, Zero Waste Chef 

You can regrow fresh green onions and basil pretty easily, indoors or out.

For green onions, when prepping, reserve about one inch of the white ends with the hairy roots, submerge those in water and after the green parts have regrown a bit, plant the onions in a pot of soil, either indoors or out. Or plant the green onions directly in the soil outside.

Basil works similarly. When you bring home a bunch of fresh basil, trim the ends of a few springs and set them aside in a jar of water. Change the water every week or so—and use that water on your houseplants! After a few weeks, you should see white hairy roots growing. Replant these ends to grow more basil, either outside or indoors in a pot in a sunny window. This trick will work even if you have stripped the leaves from the basil sprigs! Let at least some of the basil flower and attract bees—they love the stuff. In the fall, harvest your basil seeds to plant in the spring. Go here for more on growing basil from cuttings.

Photo credit: Anne-Marie Bonneau