Does “Regrowing” Vegetables Really Work?

Surely you've seen that cute little video on facebook, that (in just 2 short minutes) shows you how awesome and easy it is to regrow vegetables that you've already used.

If you haven't seen it, the clip basically goes like this: save all the carrot tops, celery bottoms, etc. after you've cut off all the part you want to eat or cook with.  Then ya just stick them in water, and BOOM! Suddenly you'll have a garden full of regrown vegetables!  Fun and free! Think of all the money you'll save, simply regrowing your table scraps, the video promises.

I'm putting this to the test. Above is a picture of a stump of celery I am attempting to re-grow.  We're now about 3 weeks in, and the stump is finally getting some decent roots and it looks like it's growing quite a bit. I'm going to let the roots develop a bit more and then I'll stick it in a pot of decent soil and see what happens.

My gut feeling is that it is going to take a loooong time to end up with a stalk of celery that is weak, underdeveloped or just leafy.  I could be wrong, but doubtful. And when you can buy a bunch of celery for like $2 bucks it hardly seems worth the effort to "regrow" my scraps. On the other hand, it makes for some nice greenery on the window sill.  I'll keep you posted.

Next time,

Michael