Growing Vegetables & Fruits From Kitchen Scraps

I’ve been making weekdays packed lunch for quite some time now. Dealing with fresh ingredients mean you’ll automatically create kitchen scraps like wilted leaves, seeds, peeled skins, etc. One day, I have the idea of saving some of the vegetables and fruits scraps and try growing them. Let’s re-purpose! It’s not a new thing actually because I’ve grown chili plant from seeds and spring onions from onions bottom before. This time, I intend to experiment with stuffs that are new to me. Btw, I’ve tried composting before and it didn’t worked for me. Compost were too gooey. 😛

First up, I tried growing celery, yau mak (baby romain) and lettuce from their scraps. They grew a little and then started to rot. Plan on growing them are currently on hold as I’ve no more space.

Next up, I saved the seeds from kitchen scraps and germinate them. Was really thrilled when I see them sprouting. Some survived pass the sprouting stage but most not (due to inexperienced, pests, diseases). Still I’m really happy. The fact that I can grow my own vegetables and fruits is REAL!

Turmeric plant grew from leftover turmeric root. This pot is located at a shade with morning sun. I also grew some at totally shaded areas but they don’t grow that much. I bet they’ll grow even better in sunny spot. You can make use of the turmeric leaves for rendang or wrapped meat. Do share if you know other uses of turmeric leaf.


Sprouting cherry tomato plants (or can they be tomato? coz I mixed the seeds up). Also placed in shaded area with morning sun. They just don’t seem to wanna grow up. I also planted a couple at the outdoor in a pot. These grew better and I’ll show a picture in another post if they survive.

Baby capsicum plant in sheltered spot with morning sun. I have plenty of success germinating them but they eventually became ill.

Sick baby capsicum plant. Symptoms are pigmented leaves with underside black spots (I suspect fungal/pest). All 20-30 of them (planted indoor) didn’t survived. 🙁 On a happier note, I also planted some at the outdoor and these didn’t seem to be affected. Like the cherry tomato, I will post an update if they survive.

Baby red spinach. They’re green when they’re baby and they only turn red with full sun. These are not from kitchen scraps but store-bought seeds. Thought I’ll just throw them in. 😛 All these are located in shaded area and they remain this same size forever.

I transferred some of them outdoor in a pot and they grew crazily large (must be my poo-rich soil and direct sun!).

Can you guess what this is? It’s baby lemon plant germinated from seed! This is a major surprise. Never knew we can grow lemon in Malaysia… what more from seed! Actually I still don’t know if they can grow into adulthood. It’s just a baby right now. I started them indoor and transferred a couple of them outdoor in a pot.

here.

And lastly…

This… can you guess what this is? It’s avocado!!!! 😍 I’ll talk more about them in a special post once I gather enough experience and data (ahem!). Update: Check out my avocado growing experience here.

A peek at the seeds that I’ve currently saved up from kitchen scraps. Mostly they are capsicum, tomato and cherry tomato seeds. There are also two lemon seeds, five cherry seeds (I know they need cool weather but I just wanna try) and avocado seeds. Right now, I don’t have additional space to plant them. So they are just sitting in the kitchen counter.

With my current state of active gardening… I secretly hope for a small outdoor garden plot to grow vegetables and fruits. The joint-neighbor garden plot is an option. I’ll most probably tumpang to grow more large fruit trees there as the soil is quite compact and dense for vegetables. We’ll see.

Come check out how these vegetables and fruits fare three months later in this post.