Growing a Garden from GROCERY STORE FOOD! 

I have taken an unused chamomile tea bag and sprinkled the tea in a small garden bed and it gave me many many chamomile plants.

I worked at Walmart and found out that those on EBT/food stamps can purchase seeds and vegetable plants with their benefits. I thought that was really awesome because someone may be struggling financially but able to put in a little time to grow some healthy food for their families.

I’ll never forget my “accidental” cantaloupe. Somehow a seed from a store bought cantaloupe made it over into our dormant burn pile. What came of that seed was the most beautiful, juiciest, and THE sweetest cantaloupe I have ever eaten in my life!

My favorite experimental grocery store garden plant was a squash, It was supposed to be a spaghetti squash , but when it produced it was a green striped squash, LIke a cross between a zucchini and spaghetti , slightly narrower at the top. But when I cooked it like a spaghetti squash, it was more tender and sweeter than the crispy bite of a spaghetti squash. It did have the feel of the spaghetti with the strands. You bet I saved those seeds! I call them my Zusketti squash. I can't wait to see what will grow from the seeds now.

I don't normally comment, but I will on this one because I have an interesting story. This last summer and it was actually getting late as well, I threw a couple of store bought tomatoes in the general direction of the compost heap from my front door and quite obviously missed. They rolled off somewhere who-knows-where but weeks later one of my friends pointed towards an old child's sandbox (a purple turtle!) that I had been planning on turning into a raised garden bed and it had just a little bit of dirt in it and a whole bunch of swampy water (and was tilted on its side!) because we had to move it suddenly one day out of the way so a vehicle could get through the yard LOL and they said, "Is that tomato?" There were six tomato plants growing in that and not only did they become substantially big, but they actually produced red ripe tomatoes, albeit small ones, before our first frost. And since I'm in zone 6B in Southeast Missouri, that was a lot later than it should have been but still... I was absolutely thrilled because I was unable to have a garden at all this year, and a couple of rotten tomatoes gifted me tomatoes so I would have something.

Rule of thumb: when Jess says to grab a cup of coffee, you pause the vlog, get up, and get yourself a cup of coffee! 😂

My sister did an experiment last year. She bought some different kinds of garlic cloves from a seed place, and then she took a handful of store-bought cloves, and planted them all. The store-bought ones were actually her biggest garlic. Also, my mom had this really cool tree in her backyard: it was actually two trees, so close together that they grew intertwined and looked like one tree. One half was plums, the other half was peaches. I guess someone had been eating fruit and spit the seeds out, and up came those trees.

Did anyone mention strawberries yet? In 2020 I took some eyebrow tweezers and picked a whole bunch of seeds out of one well ripened strawberry. I dried them on a paper plate and then in January last year sowed some indoors. I grew them on until they were ready to go in containers outside after the last frost. I've heard that strawberry plants don't produce much in their first year but one of them really took off and we got lots of beautiful strawberries from it. The others grew large but as predicted were limited on the amount of fruit. They did however develop fantastic crowns and went on to send out lots of runners which I sat into fresh pots. So now I have 12 (maybe even 15) strawberry plants all looking great as they rest for the winter. I'm already excited about harvesting a bumper crop this summer . And all from the seeds of one single strawberry 🍓. Winner!!

I grew 98.2 pounds of sweet potatoes last year from 4 store bought sweet potatoes that I put in water and made slips, then planted. Living Traditions Homestead and Hollis and Nancy's Homestead both have tutorial videos on RU-vid. Love it!

We are still eating the most delicious acorn squash from the original seeds I saved from the grocery store about 5 years/generations ago. Last year was the first time I tried ginger (my daughter bought a huge package from CostCo and wasn't going to use it all). Garlic, potatoes, sweet potatoes all have made it into my garden. I bought dill seeds 8 years ago and they just reseed and reseed every year. I've started celery from storebought celery bottoms, leaf lettuces and green onions all from the store. In fact, I haven't bought green onions for a few years because I replant the bottom 3/4" and they grow and grow. We live across the road from a sweet corn farmer and he gave us several cobs. We let one dry and planted the seeds last year and enjoyed our own sweet corn. Every time we get a pumpkin I save the seeds for next year. I was given a ghost (white) pumpkin so I'll give those a try next year. Never thought about Fennel seed. I'm going to try that. Every year about 3 weeks after I spread my compost pile around the newly planted seedlings I find random tomato, pumpkin, and squash plants. Of course I let them grow. It's all part of what I do. The week after the first Covid lockdown my hubby built me a greenhouse and I love planting all of my seedling babies.....this year I had over 200 seedlings to share with family and friends. Because many of my seeds are my own saved seeds I plant extras to insure I get good germination. This 70 year old gardener loves Jess and even though I've been gardening over 60 years I learn something all the time. BrendaLou of Deerwood Farms in rural Jordan, MN

I have grown a lot of peppers from store bought stuff. My husband laughs at me because I save so many seeds but like in 2020 when seeds were harder to find it came in handy!

This is actually really important. There are many people who cannot make it to a seed store. A lot of those stores are far and in between, and many who are concerned about food security may not have transportation to get there. Keep up the good work, Jess. I did not realize how much I can get to grow just by going to the grocery store

I was on vacation with my husband last September we went to a mini golf place and when we were golfing I look over and noticed that their patch of zinnias head were already dried up with a head of seeds I sneak over to take some if the head and turn around and my husband was standing there and said "seriously" and I said "yep and can you put them in your pocket because I don't have any pockets" then he rolled his eye....lol

After years of disappointment with over buying green onions and having to thrown half or more away from not being used quick enough...I have learned to keep a pot of soil near a window and stick them in there until I use them! Works great and I haven't had to thrown many away for awhile now! 😁

I looked at my grocery store this last weekend. I think for my size of garden (25'x30') I can get a package of dried beans for soup (15 Bean Soup). I should be able to get all of the beans, peas, legumes that I need, even if I need to sow extra for germination rates. That is $2.00 for all that I need. Talk about a budget helper!! Thanks again Jess for the idea!

Intenionally or accidentally, I've grown so many things from the store: rosemary, basil, onion, purple potato, sweet potatoes (two kinds) papayas, mangoes, lemon, orange, ginger and turmeric. The sweet potatoes probably gave me about 30 pounds of sweet potatoes!

After so many years, I still get teary eyes when you end the video blessing us.. I grew up in the capital of Romania, on the 6th floor of an apartment block. My dad had chilli peppers and basil growing in pots on the balcony, along with flowers and cacti- his pride and joy. I now live in East London and have (rent) a little, tiny garden and I’ve been growing things. It brings so much joy to be able to eat something you’ve grown! I like flowers, but LOVE our raspberries (so do our 4 children) rosemary, garlic, lovage.. When the lovage shows it’s first leaves, I know spring is coming. I long for a bigger space to grow. We haven’t got our own place yet.. I’m pacing around my “waiting room” and in the meantime I’m learning and growing interest watching you, Jess. Thank you for the lessons! The practical ones and the heartfelt ones 🤗

Last year I needed a cardboard to layer under a new raised bed so living in a small town I searched behind some local businesses for old boxes that had been thrown out. I found one that had a five pound sack of red potatoes in it. So I took them home and planted them. They grew beautifully! Had more potatoes than I could eat. Love your classroom style videos. Very well done!

Something I tried this year is growing peanuts…bought raw peanuts, shelled them, stuck them in the ground, and grew fine! Germination was maybe 70%, but wayyyy cheaper than shelled peanuts sold as seed.

I bought lemon grass from the store and stuck it into a large pot out back. In one season it filled the whole pot and was almost impossible to get out. If you plant it, be ready for it to take over.

Please keep up this "classroom" content! Even as an experienced gardener, going back to basics is always a comfy and relaxing experience with you Jess! God bless

My son wanted to plant something last summer (he's 5)...it was too late in the season to invest big...I gave him a handful of mustard seed from my pickling stash and he planted them in a kiddie pool... up came some mustard flowers!

This was great! Here’s my story: about 10 years ago I was teaching kindergarten and we planted store bought dried lima beans in clear plastic cups to see them grow. After they were about 5 inches tall I sent the ones home with kids who hadn’t drowned them (!) and that was that. About 6 months later a mom from that class came up to me and said “We want to thank you for dinner last night”. I was just a little confused until she told me that had eaten the cooked lima beans and they were delicious! I’m going to go buy some poppy seeds today… some of the things mentioned, I’d never thought of!

I love this video! So many misconceptions out there. Also, I couldn’t find seed potatoes, so I took a chance on Walmart cheapo potatoes one year🤣 I can tell you that Walmart reds and Yukon potatoes absolutely grow beautifully. I planted them a few years ago and I’m still using the same seed potatoes. Same with sweet potatoes!

I have grown potatoes, garlic, peppers, tomatoes and this year I’m doing ginger and sweet potatoes. The first year we did them we bought from Walmart in the regular section because we did not have a lot of money. Every single thing I planted grew abundantly. That year I saved for the next year and have saved from the past years planting ever since. All from cheap Walmart produce. Like Jess said, now if I’m getting something from the store I prefer to get organic or fair trade but I do not regret starting my garden with those things and building up my own little stock each year ❤️. Do not ever be discouraged in growing your own food! It’s is possible with experimentation and trial and error!

“Store bought tomatoes taste like disappointment.” Ohhh I’m feeling this right now Jess!

Hi Jess, What a great video! I did exactly what you said and grabbed my morning coffee and settled in for a wonderful teaching lesson! And I learned so much from your “class”! Thank you for all this very valuable information that can help us all be more self-sufficient and well prepared by making use of all our options and not just relying on packaged seeds. Love, Mary

Last year I bought a 1-pound package of dry pinto beans for 79 cents at the grocery store to use for cooking. I took about 1/3 of them and planted them in 3 short rows in my little garden. They flourished and I was able to can 46 pints and 5 quarts of green beans. That was in addition to the batches of fresh green beans that we ate and several batches we shared with neighbors. I think they taste just like any other green bean and they were the most prolific bean I have ever planted.

This year I had a great surprise! I was letting a volunteer grow in the garden to see what it was...by mid summer could not identify it so I pulled it out. Was stunned to see the 12 inch plant was attached to a peach pit. Must have grown from the compost I added to the garden. I replanted the peach seedling in my yard and have a 3 foot tall peach tree that I am hoping survives this winter. Zone 5

Jess great video. Here's the scoop on potatoes from the grocery store. Yes organic is best as they were not grown with chemicals and not sprayed with sprout retardant. The very best I have found are the organic fancy tiny potatoes which you may think are expensive untill you go on line and check the price of seed potatoes. I find the quality is just as good as seed potatoes and sometimes better. (There are different grades of seed potatoes but that is for another discussion) Any potato that is sprouting (organic or not) has not been sprayed with growth retatdent and is safe to grow. You can check potatoes that are not sprouting for growth retardant by putting a whole potato in a bright but not sunny window. If you do not see sprouts in 2 weeks, do not plant it (and maybe do not eat it) Sprouting whole potatoes in a window or well lit pace is a very good way to get a jump on the season as the sprouts will turn green and even sometimes form little leaves. This is called Chitting and is an old English technique for getting an early start in short season climates. When you plant these about 1 inch under the surface of the soil they will push leaves up in a couple of days if the conditions are right. contrary to what many people think, cutting big whole potatoes into sections with at least one eye per section, air drying them over night or till they feel dry to the touch, is not Chitting as these pieces are planted in the ground within one to two days of being cut. The sprouts have not had a chance to grow and turn green. Here is another tip. If you have some potatoes that grew those big long white sprouts under the sink (or where ever) You can pull those sprouts off, get rid of them, (do not waste time trying to get them to grow. They will never produce healthy robust plants.) set the potato on a windowsill for 2 to 6 weeks and it will grow healthy short green sprouts. That is Chitting and old potato and do not worry if it is a bit wrinkled. If it is really big with many sprouts You can cut it into one eye pieces and let the pieces cure for a day or two just before planting. I could literally write a book on growing potatoes LOL but this is enough for now. Hope this is helpful to some of you.

I had a (store bought) butternut squash grow out of the compost one year. We decided to allow it to grow where ever and ended up with 30 squash from one plant. Love those volunteers! 🥰

I harvested grape tomato seeds from a Dominos pizza salad. My friend took one of the plants I grew from it & they were the biggest grape tomatoes I ever saw🙂 I planted one of them in my patio garden & it did well too, though not as big.

I’m definitely a save-every-seed-I-see kind of person, and it wore off on my daughter. She was four at the time, and we had bought some chocolate covered almonds at the store. She sucked the chocolate off of them and put them in a cup of water to “grow more chocolate covered almonds” 😂 needless to say we had a lesson on where chocolate comes from lol

When I first started gardening, I started with actual tomato seeds, bought from a seed packet. But, while waiting for them to grow, I still needed tomatoes, and got a pint of cherry tomatoes from the grocery store. Those were AMAZING, and I wished to grow them, too. After some preliminary searching on RU-vid, I saw a video about how you could simply slice up rounds of a tomato, toss those rounds on some soil, lightly dust them with more soil, and let them do their thing. According to the video, those rounds would grow into tomato plants. It was enough to get me curious, I had some leftover soil from the seed tomatoes I'd planted, so I gave it a try. Took one of those wonderful storebought cherry tomatoes, sliced it into a few rounds, and tossed them in the soil. I was shocked to find, several days later, that I had a good dozen or so sprouts. I garden indoors (no outdoor space) so, after several more days, I picked out the biggest and strongest of those sprouts, and planted it. The tomatoes that came off that plant were not the same as the original pint I'd bought. But they were STILL some of the tastiest tomatoes ever. The plant itself was massive, healthy, disease free, and prolific. We had so many, my husband took them to work and his coworkers loved them, and asked for cuttings so they could grow their own clones. My plant cloned well, and they all grew their own, with equal success. My tomato plant kept producing and growing until the day I moved, which, sadly, ended its life. But that tomato plant lived for 2 years for me, and likely would've lived longer if I'd been able to keep it. I DO still have seeds saved from it, and may try growing them out to see what I end up with. Since then, I've given to regrowing a variety of storebought fruits and vegetables. I DO buy seeds (Baker's Creek has more than a little of my money, thanks to Jess xD), but I also love to maximize the output of all my produce. Green onions are ridiculously easy to grow, just leave an inch or two of the root bottom, stick it into a cup of water, put it on a windowsill, and you will see growth within half a day. Since I still have no outdoor space, with garlic and onion, I can't plant the bulbs, but, if I find any sprouting, I DO stick their root ends in water and harvest their greens for cooking. Garlic and onion chives are strong and intense, and a little goes a long way. Celery, you stick the bottom into a dish of water after chopping off the top portion of stems, and you can harvest celery greens. Same with lettuce, keep an inch or two on the the bottom, set it in a dish of water, and it will regrow new lettuce. Sweet potatoes gone to sprouting, I stick in water, and, while most just consider it a pretty plant, the leaves of a sweet potato ARE quite tasty and edible as a cooked green. I love being able to grow my own produce, but, in those times I simply can't grow something, I don't mind buying from the store, and then getting the most I can out of them. My theory has always been, it you're going to have to throw it out anyway, why NOT try and see if it will grow? You lose nothing if it fails, you gain so much if it succeeds. It's one of life's few no lose situations, all it takes is a willingness to give it a try.

Awesome job Jess! Last year I couldn’t find any seed garlic so I just tried planting ones I had from Costco. Wouldn’t you know it...they produced great (even planting them late)! And now this year I’m using that harvest to plant again 🙌🏼. I believe they were from Gilroy, CA and not even organic. And they did product scapes 🤷🏼‍♀️

Good Lord Woman! i know nothing about gardening and had no desire to grow anything. THEN i saw your face in the thumbnail and went OH I REMEMBER HER FROM AN ANIMALS VIDEO...SHE IS SO KNOWLEDGABLE ...I LOVE HER...so i clicked and watched. Again could not turn it off. You are so watchable, and so easy to understand, and i learnt SO MUCH just from this half hour my mind is boggling and im full of enthusiasm and about to dig up my yard and run to my kitchen to see what i can find to try and grow! YOU ARE A WONDERFUL BLESSING. THANKYOU so much.

I planted five stalks of store-bought green onion in my in-ground garden one summer. I was able to crop the leaves every week for cooking. They did grow big and their stems and leaves looked like those on a regular yellow onion. The leaves tasted a bit more spicy and were not as tender, but worked very well with authentic Chinese cooking. What I did not expect is that I was able to harvest onion bulbs from them. I stopped watering and checking on them after frost had killed the top (zone 5b). Coming around Christmas, when we needed just one more onion for cooking, I dug them up and we got four full-size yellow onions. The fifth stalk produced no bulb. My take on growing store-bought onion/ginger/garlic/bok choy/potato/sweet potato is that if I have something going bad in the fridge, I bury them in the garden. Not successful every time, but there is nothing to lose.

I bought spoiling food from a local organic store and was able to grow an entire summer garden from food scraps. I had tomatoes, potatoes, green peppers, celery, green onions, lettuce, herbs, and I think a few others but I can’t remember. Some turned out great, others were kind of wimpy, but I think the success had more to do with my lack of understanding about proper soil and growing everything in pots. It is good to know my kiss of death hands might not be my fault when it comes to basil and cilantro, so I’ll try sprouting proper seeds next time and not getting herb plants from the grocery store. Thanks for the informative video, I’m excited to try all the citrus seeds I’ve been saving, pretty sure they’re cross pollinated, but I like citrus trees 😊

I have successfully grown, organic, store bought, onions, celery, potatoes, tomatoes, peppers.

May I just say, I love your spontaneous, self produced videos. I realize that filming Wilder Still frees you and Miah from the mechanics of production and is more freeing, but for me that isn’t the “real” you. “You” are the spontaneous laugh, the loving exchanges with Miah and the kids, the “this is what I found” moments…I could go on and on. I am happy that you have both venues but my heart is always happy when a daily vlog appears. I can’t wait to see each step as the farm evolves (or should I say explodes) as you build your dream.

In my 70's and planted from store seeds lots. My Mom lived through the depression and taught me how. She was just like your Mom with dead heads. In fact, she would embarrass the devil out of us cause she would do that in nurseries. Go in peoples yards to get a cutting of something she wanted!! LOL You made me laugh with memories today. BTW I have had some seeds for 10 years and they still grow.

You can also use store-bought bulk chia, flax, sesame, mung beans, lentils as a cover crop!

I’ve grown tangerine, Asian pear and gala apple from store bought. The gala apple took over ten years to get fruits. I had 5 apples last summer and they tasted so sweet and delicious.

Mom...78...cut a sweet pepper and threw out all the seeds in a box of dirt and garbage...about a week later hundreds of pepper seedlings were filling that box...burnt up in the Florida sun but we were both surprized, pleased and have since planted as you do veggies from the store just to see now if it will grow.

I put the tiny sprout from the inside of celery into water into a sunny window, and eventually put into potting soil. the plant grew tally and went to seed in the heat of summer. I collected the seeds and planted them into containers this fall. The plants are really doing well- wish me luck!

Hi, Jess. Yes, I have grown quite a few things over the years that were purchased from the grocery store. My first exposure to this concept was back in 1966. Dad bought a couple bags of long-grain, wild rice from the grocery store and spread the seeds in the swamp (along the shore line) that was on the back end of our property. When the time came for harvest, we used the canoe. It worked so well, that we grew long grain wild rice every year thereafter - until the house was sold in the late 70’s. You have water on your new property, so planting along the shore line might be an option for your family. Anyway, YES, there are many things that can be grown from what you buy at the grocery store. Don’t forget caraway and anise - wonderful flavorings for many dishes, including bread!

Our local grocery store sells lettuce with the roots still on. I take those home, pot them up and keep them under a grow light that supplements the light on a window sill. I love that the lettuce I'm eating is really fresh and that I can pick a few leaves for a sandwich or salad just like in the summer. Obviously there aren't enough hours of daylight in the winter to keep the lettuce actively growing but with the addition of a grow light I still get new growth.

Thanks Jess.!...I hear you say, " just try growing your food" and that's what I've been doing. Not stressing about being perfect. And I take chances 'cause seeds want to grow, plants want to grow.

I never thought of the spice isle! That's brilliant! I discovered pinto beans grew well when my 3 year old pushed the pinto beans I gave her to play with as a sensory activity into the soil of my started plants and they grew wonderfully!😂🌻

When I was in Florida visiting daughter buys organic tomatoes, an had some called Kumato tomato, I saved seeds from 1 an dried them for about a month planted it an put on my grow tent tookb2 weeks to germinate but I just ate my first Kumato tomato it was delicious 😋

I've grown several rounds of potatoes from my store bought potatoes that I didn't use quickly enough and sprouted. It's easy enough to dig a hole and stick it in there. It's really so easy I wish I had known sooner. I also accidentally grew basil from clippings when keeping them in water for a couple days after picking from a plant in my garden. It's really amazing how many things will just grow on accident, especially keeping in mind how many things I actually end up killing when I try to keep it alive.

While it took about 4 years … I have harvested three pineapples from a store-bought pineapple top (and the pups from the original plant). They are SO sweet and juicy and delicious!

I put the last few inches of grocery store green onions in a pot of soil in my kitchen window. This gives me several months of snipping green onions to add to my meals.

I would LOVE to see a video of how you plant that ginger!!! And updates on how you care for it as it grows!!! 🙏🙏🙏😍😍😍😍

I love getting produce from the farmers market and save the seeds from peppers, pumpkins etc. I will be experimenting this year with those seeds. I figured if they were grown locally they were good for my garden and our short summers here in CO.

I have grown potatoes from chunks of potato..14. tomatoes plants from a slice of tomato planted. Pumpkins and coriander. Currently waiting on a date pip, avocado and mango seed. I also grew a lemon tree from a seed to. It's fascinating to watch these types of video.

I have grown pretty much every herb in the past from the grocery store. I have a sage plant and a thyme plant that are over 5 years old that came from a store. I have also grown potatoes from the grocery store. But those are hit and miss. Usually when I do the taters, it's just because I let them go and the eyes started popping up. So, I planted them as an experiment. I experiment all the time with this stuff.

We planted some black oil sunflower bird seed that we had a lot of and we got these beautiful small sunflowers that were great for cutting and had a pretty long vase life.

Since I was a teenager, we've grown popcorn, black eyed peas, tomatoes(heirloom), eggplant, pumpkins, winter squash varieties, chia, sweet potato varieties, reg. potatoes, lemon tree and tangelo tree. The eggplant and lemon tree were both grow as volunteers and the eggplant was the best eggplant bush I've ever grown. The lemon tree I didn't think would really come to anything and now regret not moving it as it's well over 6' tall and I want that space to extend my porch. The Tangelo was a purchase from a school fund raiser and my oldest daughter got a few seed to sprout in an experiment, 1 of which survived. That tree is now 16 years old and loaded is sweet fruit every year.

I am a new gardener just learning in my 70s .... and this year I grew an entire bed of sweet potatoes 4' x 12' from the slips grown from ONE store-bought sweet potato!!

I had no choice during the great seed shortage of 2020 to save seeds and regrow vegetables from the grocery store. My cherry tomatoes were different shapes, but still tasted wonderful. This year the store potatoes yielded way more of a harvest than the seed potatoes I ordered. So, yes, in times of seed shortages, it can be done!

I love growing lemon seeds from store bought lemons! I know I’ll probably never get any lemons but they are fun to grow, free seed and make a beautiful houseplant!

Thank you so much. I've been looking at seeds to buy but have realized I can only buy very little since I'm on fixed income. Now I feel confident that I can supplement what I can buy with planting a lot from my own pantry and groceries.

I have grown almost every vegetable, herb, fruit, and root vegetables from store bought food. I prefer to use food from farmers markets and definitely organic! Some of them came from either use it or loose it situations and others were bought for that purpose alone. My favorite are keeping the bottoms of my green onions and celery stalks. Every one I buy i place either in water for few days or directly in beds andI have some green onions that are several years old and are growing strong. Pupkins, gourds, tomatoes, papaya, souor sop, canteloupe, watermelon, lemons, limes, oranges, apples etc. I have had success from it all. I live in Southern texas zone 8b-9. I have never commented before but this is such a polarizing topic I wanted to weigh in. I had done tons of research and decided I needed to kow for myself andit was a huge success!

Last year I experimented. I took 10 of every bean in my cupboard from the grocery store -9 varieties. My average was 8.2 beans sprouted per variety and I learned which were bush (7/9) and which were pole (2/9). Package would just say something like “small white beans” so now I know which is which. I planted them and let them run their course, not eating anything, and just saved the seeds for this year as they are now acclimated to my climate for 1 generation. I saved about 90% of the resulting seeds. I now have an average of 147 seeds of each variety (I planted them as the last planting of the year so they grew in extreme California drought!). So, now I can plant what I want, knowing which are bush and which are pole, of the varieties that I want. Will I grow pinto? No. Too easy to get and too cheap. Will I grow the Christmas Lima (pole) and the small pink (yes!). YES, YES, YES! It is good to experiment and try. We did the same with mini pumpkins - success! - and coriander, and dill. Funny you mentioned those too!

I grew a row of black eyed peas from the grocery store in my little "classroom" trial garden in crappy soil before we got our raised bed gardens in place. They grew better than almost anything I planted from actual bought "seeds".

It's fun that I come across this video months later. In March 2022 (or so), I was cutting up a store-bought hot house tomato and got the idea to toss a slice of it into a tub of potting soil where my herbs had been just outside my patio door. With dinner on the stove, I just walked out and buried it, watered it in, and left it alone. I'm so impressed that it actually grew and I transplanted it into my first in-ground vegetable garden. It's June and it has blooms on it. I have no idea what I'll end up with or if it will be good, but that just goes to show you that a store-bought vegetable can absolutely be cultivated to make more food. Green onions are my favorite. I don't seed them. I just pick up a bundle at the store while I'm out.

Greetings from Australia. POATOES: Try this - When you buy potatoes for the kitchen store them until they sprout. When the sprouts are about an inch long break them off, plant them in starter cups , keep them well watered and plant them out when they are a few inches tall. You get HEAPS of new plants that way and you still get to eat the potatoes you paid for.

Such great information!! I remember when I was like 20 and with my first husband who is Hispanic, he came in the kitchen one day asking where I kept the dried beans. I was confused and asked why. He’s like I’m planting the garden. I didn’t believe he could plant those beans and get them to grow but he did. I learned something that day lol. We were very poor and back then (30 years ago)…there was no such thing as organic that I knew of anyway lol so we had the cheapest store brand beans out there! But they grew and we ate them 😊💚

I've grown eyes from potatoes last year matter-of-fact -- I'm sure it wasn't organic. I love your Aunt Martha -- pull the seeds from a pepper in a salad at a restaurant. LOVE IT! Deadheading plants everywhere -- hahhaahhahahahahhahaha!!!! I knew I was going to learn a lot from this video.

I stumbled across a video on how to grow a lemon tree from a store bought lemon. Just for laughs I bought one, organic and followed the instructions on the video. Out of 3 seeds from that lemon 2 germinated. I gave one to my neighbour and have the other on my kitchen window sill at the moment as it’s still quite small. It’s growing well though.

Last year was my first ever year growing anything from seeds. Grew two beautiful sunflowers from the seeds I'd bought to make granola with, which was so exciting. It will be fun to figure out what experiments to grow this year.

OMG! I knew I could plant dried beans and grow plants with them, but I never associated that with my beloved dried green flageolet beans, which are ridiculously expensive to purchase! I'm very excited to experiment with this during the summer!

I have done this for years, it's nice to see my crazy ideas validated by someone else :) I always save seeds from produce that I buy at the store and farmers market! I have also thrown store bought potatoes, ginger and lettuce bottoms into the dirt and grow stuff! Oh, and I also bought a huge bag of garlic from Costco and planted the whole thing and it all came up!

I got celery from the store. I chopped off the staulks and put the root part in water. The outside staulks wilted and then started to look mutant. While that was happening, the center portion started to grow taller and add new leaves. I put this mutant mess in the garden and got some new staulks and seeds. It was a worthy experiment. The new celery had great flavor with amazing depth. It was nothing like the cardboard flavor I started with in the beginning.

I'll never forget the volunteer "pumpkin" that grew in my garden one year. It produced exactly one fruit. It was round like a pumpkin, had skin like a spaghetti squash, and insides like a loofa. Even the squirrels (who typically ravage any pumpkin left outside past October) wouldn't touch it, lol. I think it was a cross between a pumpkin and zucchini I had grown the year before. I've grown garlic from local farmer's stands (I figured if they grew well for local farmers they would grow well for me) and before I knew where to find heirloom tomato seeds I would pick up "fancy" tomatoes at farmers markets to save seeds from. I still grow multiple tomatoes plants every year from those seeds (or their offspring's seeds). One summer I grew canary melon from the seeds of one I bought at a local fruit farm. All that original produce cost a bit more than I would normally pay at the grocery store, but it was like a two for one: I got food to eat immediately and grew more food from it the following year.

I've grown from store bought russet potatoes, sweet potatoes, red bell peppers, pumpkins, watermelons, kabocha squash, cherry tomatoes. Regrown on the counter from store bought: green onions, romaine lettuce & celery. This will be my third year gardening in Manitoba, Canada 🇨🇦 Zone 3B 🥰

Wheels are SURE spinning in my Gardener Brain. Thank you! I have dead-headed dried seed heads while walking at parks and even reached out to dead-head tall plants at fast food drive-thru's to save the seeds in envelopes. Wow!

I watched this video a while back and thought OMG!!! So I had a bag of pinto, navy and great northern beans and thought Im gonna give it a try!!! I had an empty bed so I thought why not! So I split the bed up between the 3 beans and guess what??? We got beans!!! They look just like the beans that I bought at the store and planted!!! I thought ok well lets try this again, I just planted another whole bed of pinto beans! Thanks Jess for this. Oh by the way, when it was time to shuck the beans my husband said, let me help you, I said ok, well he is the one that told me to plant more beans because he like popping the beans out of the pods! He says he has a new job to help out with the garden!!! Thanks again Jess, LOVE watching your videos!

I have 2 beautiful lemon trees, that I grew from store bought lemons. I grew a couple of avocado trees from store bought avocados.

I’ve grown gorgeous purple stemmed basil from the sprigs included in carry-out pho! Managed to get a couple generations of fragrant, delicious basil from one dinner. So check sources of food other than the grocery store too!

I've grown, garlic, ginger, tumeric, green onions, tomatoes and potatoes, from the grocery store. Plus lots of random volunteers from the compost pile.

I’ve had trouble finding certain seeds over the last couple years, only to find the fruits of which being sold at the grocery store. You better believe I bought that produce just for the seeds! And I’ve never been let down so far- everything from tomatoes, peppers and ground cherries to potatoes and ginger. I highly recommend! 😀

I teach my students that you can easily grow food from the grocery store. Of course, the produce grown may not always turn out as the parent seeds, however, it'll still be edible produce that can feed you and your family. My students and I have grown ginger, garlic and butternut squash from the grocery store.

I did have an accidental batch of mustards grow in my compost pike once. They were beautiful and tasty. Truly appreciate your videos. So helpful and meaningful.

William was like the cherry on top of a nice, helpful video! He's beautiful. Made me think of Kitten George.

Jess, thanks so much for sharing your knowledge. I found you guys about two years ago when looking for help on best things for beginners to grow. I experimented with several different veggies and herbs to see what worked best for me. We have very similar climates. I am close to Texas coast line. It’s a lot of hard work for an older gal, but was worth the effort and was very therapeutic for me. Also I was so pleased that you minister and I truly believe that God put you on my path for a reason. Because of you I have found the hope I had lost. Thanks so much for your sweet heart. I pray our Father continues to bless you and your beautiful family.

I sprouted an Avacado tree from a seed from the grocery store. It's about two years old now. Still anticipating what the fruit will be like. If not good, I can still use it as a root stock and graph better types to it.

My whole small garden this past spring was from seeds I save from my organic produce from my local whole food store during the pandemic. In a panic, I save every organic fruit/vegetable seed that came through the door. I basically removed the seeds, rinsed them, and allowed them to air dry on a paper plate or napkin. Then, labeled them up in little seed bags purchased from Amazon. I grew cantaloupe, cucumbers, mini sweet peppers, regular sized bell pepper, and tomatoes. I still have quite the seed collection of fruits and vegetables. I plan to experiment with the fruit tree seeds (i.e., apples, pears, and peach seeds) this year with my grand daughter in an effort to teach her how to be self-suffiecint. Love the video, and thanks for sharing. 😉

I bought a bag of those small red, yellow and orange peppers from Walmart grocery and decided to harvest the seeds. A friend told me they are called pocket peppers. I planted them and about 10 of the seeds grew. They produced beautiful red, yellow and orange peppers. Now they took all summer and into the fall before they turned their colors, but they produced abundantly. I canned, froze, ate and gave fresh to family and friends because they produced so many. I also harvest sweet green pepper seeds, and they grew, but were very small in size. Today, I just harvested seeds from a giant sweet green pepper to save in hopes it will grow in this years garden. Thank you for sharing the information about seeds!

PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE do more videos of this nature. I know it can be repetitive and too much information for those that are more advanced and I would just ask you to skip over these videos but for those of us that are just getting started the wealth of information and knowledge that I just got from this one video alone is very encouraging. Jess, wow thank you and God bless you!

I've grown potatoes, sweet potatoes, garbanzo beans, garlic Onions, squashes (butternut and Acorn) zucchinis, all kind of peppers, dried beans, lentils, tomatoes, buckwheat, rainbow corn (at Halloween) and right now I have 5 cute little lemon trees growing a window to be repotted in the spring. It is a lot of fun.

I've sprouted and grown a peach tree from a pit out of a roadside stand. I've sprouted strawberries from a store berry. My elephant garlic game from the store. Potatoes, green onions, and leeks are all growing from store produce. I squished a cherry tomato into a pot and grew tons! I just picked up some pine cones from the yard...will it sprout? That's the fun part of the game! My sweet potato is putting off slips... that's next!

I've done a lot of experiments like this! Or I'll re-grow vegetables. For example when my celery isn't mature enough to harvest yet and I buy a bunch from the store, I'll save the stump, put it into a little water and grow a whole new plant. I also discovered that when I harvest early cabbages in the garden and only remove the head, leaving the roots and outer leaves in the ground, it'll grow a whole new head. A smaller one than the first head, but hey - free food! Also if supermarket onions or garlic start to sprout, I'll plant them into the ground for delicious onion and garlic greens. Besides potatoes and sweet potatoes, store-bought Jerusalem artichokes are also easy tubers to grow and cost a lot less than "seed" tubers. When my grandmother lived and was younger, she'd bury the pits of store-bought peaches she ate into the soil on the off-chance one would sprout, and grew two peach trees that way (I have her garden now and still find this or that ancient peach pit in the soil, haha).

Last year I grew garlic, ginger, beans, potato, and sweet potato slips. I've definitely grown things that aren't organic. This year I already planted store bought Garlic

I saved seed from the biggest, most gorgeous red, yellow and orange peppers from the store and grew gorgeous red, yellow and orange peppers. Also had great luck regrowing seed from the small 3” peppers from Costco. Great success also with store bought butternut squash, potatoes, garlic. Bought a big watermelon in June and my kids spit a seed into the well-composted flower bed, and grew a giant, delicious watermelon the same season!

Thanks for turning the wheels, Jess! No telling how far I will go. 🚜 🌻 😊

I've saved seeds from red, yellow and orange peppers from the grocery store & they were fine. I've potted up celery bottoms & although I didn't get stalks per se, the leafy thin stems were great for soups, stews, green & tuna/chicken salads & meatloaf. Tons of celery flavor in those leaves. I'm an opportunistic seed collector too. I got some gorgeous celosia seeds from the McDonald's drive thru landscaping. Heck, I grew a big pot of moss roses/portulaca from a fifty cent seed pack & collected seeds all season like it was my job. I ended up with a half full quart size ziplock bag which is saying something because those seeds are teensy. My gardening buddy neighbor lady thought I was nuts out on the sidewalk with my tweezers, paper plate and flowerpot😄

I grew bread seed poppies from store bought seeds for cooking last year. They grew from about 8 year old seeds. I found the seeds hidden away in a cupboard and immediately thought of Jess. I thought you never know. I went out in the fall and just tossed them around the yard. And then last spring surprise, surprise I got about 10 flowers to pop up. Saved the seeds from them and replanted this fall. I also saved some pepper seeds from the store this summer. I made sure it was a red one from the mix I bought. I also garlic start sprouting at the time you plant garlic and threw those into the ground in the fall. They are currently doing great. Can't wait to see how they did this year. Also got surprise winter squash from my compost from one I bought for decorative use the previous year. I am very much of let's plant it and find out type.

I found a sack of red potatoes in the back of my pantry. I shrugged, tossed them in the dirt, and they were amazing! Great success 👍