While Microgreens are known for their freshness, this crispness can come at a cost. Microgreens unfortunately go soggy pretty quickly after harvesting. Never fret, we are going to discuss two simple ways to store your greens and insure that you are still able to reap the benefits of these nutrient dense plants! 

Harvesting Your Microgreens

Harvesting Microgreens is best when using either a sharp scissors, like our Ashinaga or Higurashi Scissors. Their small knife-like blades are able to get into the hard to reach places and give your greens a clean cut. Another way to harvest them is to use a sharp kitchen knife. The benefit of growing off of hemp grow mats is that when you are ready to harvest, you can lift your mats out of the trays, set it on the counter and have a somewhat mess free harvest.

Storing Your Microgreens

After you have harvested your greens, it’s time to store your Microgreens. The key to storing Microgreens is to keep them dry. Avoid watering your Microgreens 24 hours before you plan to harvest, this way they are dry when you harvest you can also spin your greens in a salad spinner to ensure you remove excess moisture. Storing them wet makes them mushy right away. Keeping them cool is also important to retaining their freshness. Only wash your Microgreens when you are ready to eat them, be careful of the water temperature. Microgreens prefer lukewarm water.

Two Methods of Storing

The two best ways to store Microgreens are refrigerating them in a plastic bag, air-tight container or by dehydrating them.

Refrigeration Method

Once you have harvested and dried off your greens, put them in an airtight container and place them in the fridge and they should be good for up to 10 days. A good way to avoid having your Microgreens completely dry out while keeping them moist enough to stay hydrated is to put a damp paper towel into the container you’re storing the Microgreens in. You can also put a dry paper towel in to absorb moisture. While we are very big fans of glass storage containers, they do tend to collect more condensation. Reusable plastic containers tend to do better, however, any airtight storage container will do just fine.

Filling Your Containers

As far as packing your Microgreens into containers, the general rule of thumb is that you don’t want there to be too much air inside the container otherwise your greens will oxidize. You also shouldn’t cram your containers too tightly. Your greens need room to breathe and packing them too tightly will bruise and damage your greens.

Dehydration Method

Way back when Skyhaven Harvest was doing farmers markets we offered our Microgreens dehydrated. This is a flavorful and nutrient dense method that could be used as seasoning or in smoothies. We would dehydrate our greens then blend them into a powder to form a spice. You can also dehydrate them to make them more like kale chips. You will need a dehydrator for this to work, using the natural powers of the sun will only result in mold or insects. So if you’re willing to invest this is a great multi-purpose tool for your kitchen! You can also use an oven to dehydrate them. Set the oven to its lowest temperature (below 200 degrees F) and let them sit in there for 6-10 hours. Dehydrated greens can last up to 5 years!

Growing at home will result in a lot more Microgreens than buying them from the store, unfortunately the greens will need to be harvested all at once. We hope you find this article a useful resource when figuring our how to store your harvest!