Enjoying Wintersown Salads

By Alex Panozzo

On January 18th, solidly within the grip of our Midwestern winter, I decided that I needed the flavor and freshness that only 'homegrown' could provide. I pulled out a few shallow baskets and lined them with florists' polyfoil. (I had it on hand, but any liner would do -- even a heavy-duty garbage bag cut to size.) I poked a number of drainage holes through the liners and then filled them to within about an inch and a half of the top with a good potting mix.

I scattered a mixture of leaf-type lettuce seed evenly over one of the baskets and 'Red Silk' radish seed over the other baskets. I gently covered the seeds with about a quarter of an inch of the potting mix and watered them thoroughly with warm water. Since they were in a rather cool place, I set them on a heated pad and covered them with a piece of dark tarp to hold in the heat and moisture for a couple of days. I then replaced the dark tarp with clear plastic to prevent stretching when the little seedlings began to peak through the soil.

Keeping the baskets covered to maintain a warm, moist environment is very beneficial to successful seed germination. As each basket sprouted, I removed the clear plastic sheet and made sure to keep the soil warm and the young plants in as much sun as I could find (given the short, often cloudy days). Supplementing with fluorescent lighting six to eight hours a day is also an option, but I wasn't in a big hurry, so I let nature take its course.

A little behind the full-season schedule, but still more than a month away from any outdoor life, I was snipping tender lettuce leaves and plucking radishes for sensational salads and snacking! I chose not to add additional fertilizer, because the crops were small and the fertility of the mix I was using was adequate to bring the crop to harvest. I was able to cut the lettuce twice and then transplant the individual plants into the garden. (The used soil went into the compost pile.) Some of the radishes were a bit small, but all were very mild, crisp and full of flavor.