How to grow a forest of pea shoots in just 2 weeks
no outside space needed + it's rewarding, fulfilling and empowering
This essay is part of the You Can Do This series where I share empowering and practical how to guides that will hopefully help you acquire a new lifelong skill.
Hi! This is Leyla from A Day Well Spent, a newsletter seeking pathways to more purposeful living.
What subscribers received recently:
Some deep talk about karma
'Dance has the power to heal in ways words never can' - an interview
Just getting started; you could say I’m behind on 2025
You can subscribe with your email to ensure you never miss my posts:
It’s here 🌷
I’m going to be bold and declare that spring has officially sprung.
After complaining about the weather like a true Brit once I returned from Buenos Aires at the start of February, the temperature dial has seen significant improvements in London. I’m delighted.
Don’t get me wrong, it’s still damn cold.
But the crocuses and daffodils are up in my little patch of wildflower meadow, I’m flinging the back door wide open each morning (got to change that air) and as I type this, I have just spotted a robin collecting leaves bigger than its own body – it seems to be fashioning a nest amongst the tangle of jasmine. Joy!
This subtle change in seasons heralds the very beginning of the year’s growing season.
But it’s time for a gardening break
My little London garden reached the dizzying heights of stardom last year and was featured on the Gardeners’ World — it got a full 8 minute segment!1 Monty Don said my name!
Last year my first ever attempt at growing sweet potatoes – outside, may I add – was a wild and unexpected success (I properly cured them and they are still storing perfectly in an unheated room in the house), the sweetcorn was a spectacular failure and there were plenty more crops that fell somewhere in between.
Despite this, for the first time in about 17 years since I sowed my first ever vegetable seed, I’ve decided I’m going to take a bit of a break from gardening – 2025 will be a fallow year if you like.
There’s just too much going on behind the scenes right now, I’m having to focus my attention elsewhere.
That doesn’t mean I won’t be growing anything
Dear reader, I am but human.
For me, nurturing some kind of edible plant is core to my wellbeing. The satisfaction from seed sowing to harvest to eating is unrivalled. Plus, I’ll still have my bundle of raspberry canes which bestowed upon me no less than 7kg of berries last summer (see how to grow kilos of raspberries).
But I’ll be forgoing the usual outside annual crops this year and instead focussing on some smaller windowsill projects.
I added some ginger and turmeric roots to my next organic veg box delivery and I intend to stick them in some soil in an attempt to grow my own. I’ve watched videos and it seems you just treat them like a house plant and within a few months, you should have a load of roots under the soil. I’ll let you know how that goes.
I’ll also continue to grow basil following my easy, quick and reliable method as well as carry on fermenting vegetables that arrive in my weekly veg delivery, to make flavour-packed pickles full of probiotics.
The other thing I’ll be growing indoors for quick win satisfaction are these delicious and nutritious pea shoots - they’re ready to harvest in just two weeks!
Aren’t they just so beautiful and don’t they look impressive!
If you appreciate this piece please let me know by tapping the ❤️ at the top or bottom or by forwarding it on — thank you!
In today’s column I share a step-by-step guide on how to grow a dense forest of delicious pea shoots in just 2 weeks, indoors. And I’ve included a video so you can watch me doing it 🎥
Absolutely anybody and everybody can and should have a go at growing pea shoots for the following reasons:
You don’t need any outside space, just a windowsill inside your house. And it doesn’t even need to get that much sun
You will harvest your first pea shoots just two weeks after sowing them
You get a lot of pea shoots from such a tiny surface area
They are treated as ‘cut and come again’ leaves, meaning you will in fact get two harvests from just one sowing
Buying a bag of pea shoots from the supermarket is expensive! So you’re saving money
Growing some of your own food, at whatever scale, is one of the most purposeful, fulfilling and self-empowering things a person can do
How to grow a dense forest of pea shoots in just 2 weeks
In this guide I cover
What pea shoots are
The type of pea seeds to sow for pea shoots and where to get them
The type of container pea shoots should be grown in
How to sow and grow pea shoots (🎥)
How to identify when the pea shoots are ready to harvest (🎥)
How to correctly harvest pea shoots for a second flush of growth (🎥)
What happens after harvesting a tray twice
How to grow a constant supply of pea shoots
What are pea shoots?
Pea shoots are basically pea plants, but the whole plant is harvested as a very young shoot, rather than letting them grow to maturity for the actual peas themselves. You could also think of them as pea microgreens.
And they taste of peas, the first taste of summer!
Pea shoots are nutritious and delicious eaten raw. Roughly chopped, they often make up the bulk of my salads dressed simply with extra virgin olive oil, a squeeze of lemon and salt and pepper. Or you can cook them lightly as you would spinach.
What pea seeds should I use for growing pea shoots?
The seeds we will use to grow pea shoots are dried peas themselves. You can purchase actual pea seeds from garden centres, but they can be quite expensive as they’re sold for their mature plant characteristics.
Seeing as we will need quite a lot of dried peas to grow our pea shoots, it’s more economical to purchase the kind of whole dried peas you would use for cooking.
For example in the UK, we have dried peas which are known as marrowfat peas, and these are often used to make mushy peas, a very British dish often served in fish and chip shops.
The brand I find most easily is Batchelors. A whole box of these dried peas costs just 85p. Or there’s the wonderful Hodmedod’s who sell a range of dried peas.
Using different kinds of peas will create pea shoots with slightly different flavours - using a mix of different peas would be a great shout!
Outside of the UK check a well stocked supermarket, look online or try a health food shop that sells dried pulses.
Point to note
When buying dried peas from a food shop, the word ‘peas’ can sometimes be used for different things. In some cultures it actually means beans. And don’t buy ‘split peas’ where the seed has been split in half, as these won’t germinate. You want whole, dried peas.