[tosca100]

I made a risotto with broad beans, asparagus, carrot thinnings and pea shoots....delicious!YUM

[mobilekat]

Sounds good- by carrot thinnings do you just mean the roots, or can you use the tops too?

[tosca100]

Don't know if you can use the tops, but I just used the roots, just to give a little different colour.

[mobilekat]

Thanks Tosca- just been researching carrot tops and found

http://www.carrotmuseum.co.uk/recipes.html#tops

So will try a few in a salad- I have been suffering cramp when cycling recently and the carrot tops sound like a cheaper source of Potassium!

I will let you know how they go- and stick to the little ones!

[1jim]

Has anyone tried gorwing these dried peas into full sized plants, are the peas they produce nice?

[Livinhope]

This is from a number of years ago when money was tight but I remember growing the packeted marrow fat peas for pods.  They didn't grow all that tall and the pods only contained a few large peas but it was lovely to have fresh peas from the garden.  Yesterday I planted 'cooking peas', just as an experiment, but they weren't marrowfat, in fact the peas were quite small so hopefully they may produce some tender sweet peas.

[zazen999]

The great thing about pea shoots is that they grow during the winter too so you can sow a pot once a month and have pea shoots all year round.

[1jim]

do you grow them inside (like cress) or outside?

[suziet88]

In Asda the boxes of dried peas are only 29p for 250g - cheap as chips!

[mobilekat]

You can grow them indoors or outside- most people go indoors in the winter on a window sill.

Chuck loads of pea into a pot of compost and add water!- I have a 8 inch pot full of compost, a layer of peas- literally a BIG handful, cover with an inch of compost and water well.

They will come up as thick as you can imagine.

Once about 4 inches tall, chop off the tops and eat!- we had a big handful of the tendrils in a salad tonight- very yum!

I have been known to pop an handful in to a small hole dug just about anywhere in the garden- poor OH suddenly finds them popping up when he is on watering duty (I am away lots!)

[Maryann]

Bought 2 boxes of the Bigga marrofat peas (from Waitrose  ) and planted some up in a seed tray (will be a week tomorrow). Cant see a thing happening in tray yet so just wondered how long it takes to see any movement. I assume the peas don't need to be soaked prior to sewing?

[mumofstig]

first post said a week .................

[mobilekat]

As they are planted so thick you tend to notice the compost rising up in the air, before they burst through- we have them coming up in many places at the moment.

I have found the longer you leave them, the stronger the taste.

Just had a Thai style salad with noodles, pea shoot, lettuce and home made fish cakes- Very Yum!

[barbarella]

Bought 2 boxes of the Bigga marrofat peas (from Waitrose  ) and planted some up in a seed tray (will be a week tomorrow). Cant see a thing happening in tray yet so just wondered how long it takes to see any movement. I assume the peas don't need to be soaked prior to sewing?

Not all Waitrose branches sell them - ours doesn't so I will have to try somewhere else.  I always find  peas take a bit longer than most stuff.  So does coriander.  It is my third year growing veg and I am only just getting tuned in to germination times

[Maryann]

Shoots started to come through after about 10 days but only in patches....I must be doing something wrong 

They were sown in a flat seed tray with normal seed compost, and put outside in an open fronted greenhouse (you know the cheap little plastic ones with zip up front). They are watered daily so don't dry out too much.

If the other seeds dont start shooting soon then we wont get enough to make a contribution to the stir fry or salads. Hubby says he put about 60 peas in the tray (rows of 6 x 10) so maybe thats not the way to do it?