Garden Series: Cilantro

Garden Series: Cilantro

Indian cuisine feels like its missing salt when it misses this herb. Cilantro, with its tender green leaves and wonderful aroma makes for tasty meals and beautiful focal points for pictures on food blogs! Here's how you grow it in your backyard / in pots.

Take a small pot; small is key here. Cilantro does better when you keep pruning it for daily use rather than leaving it remain in it's pot for long periods of time. If you do leave it, it's going to turn to flower and then to seed.

Pot Size & Seeds

Sow cilantro seeds directly in soil 1/2 inch below soil level. Alternately - you can soak seeds in water overnight and sow them the next day in soil. The internet also suggests cracking the seeds open, rubbing them against a floor before planting etc... but the first two options have always worked for me.

Sun

Knowing how much sun is too much sun is key if you want to flaunt a green thumb. Most plants do very well with beginner experimentation and some simply refuse to cooperate. Cilantro is inbetween.

Position the pots West / North West facing, in a warm spot where there is sun light but no direct sun.

Water

Until the plants sprout, water regularly. This can take a few weeks when you are starting up. Once the plant is established; water once every few days allowing the soil to go dry inbetween watering sessions. This is done to prevent flies and pests from swarming around your plants.

Weed or Cilantro?

As Cilantro sprouts from seed - it looks dangerously similar to weeds. Most beginners are peeking at their pots multiple times in a day that they see weed when they see baby cilantro and promptly pluck it out of the soil. Do not do that! Please see below images of baby cilantro from seed and a grown plant.

Good luck growing yours!