Fresh and fast-growing vegetables. These are my bok choy leaves, right in my kitchen in the middle of winter!

Knowing which vegetables I can count on for a quick harvest is one of the most important aspects of self-sufficiency. A lot of them take months to grow, while others only need a few weeks in the soil. As soon as I notice that my stock is running low, I just do a sowing of fast-growing vegetables. Ready in no-time!

Read More: How to Grow Baby Bok Choy

I decided to grow a mix of different bok choy seeds, but my red varieties seem to have disappeared. Did I mix up the seed packets?

I'm putting my fast-growing vegetables in this old candy box I got from the local store. I drilled holes in the bottom and the sides to get an airflow going.

Mix of Fast-Growing Vegetables

Growing a mix of bok choy varieties is probably my favorite way to get fresh leaves quickly. They grow so fast with the right conditions. I did this sowing on the 13th of November. I just scattered the seeds on top of soil in an old candy box with holes in the bottom. It's been sitting in a cool space indoors (around 60 degrees or 15 degrees Celsius) with a grow light shining on it for eight hours a day. Since bok choy is a short-day plant that bolts easily, I keep the grow light on for fewer hours than I would with other sowings and plants.

One interesting thing about this particular sowing is that I did it in compost soil from my greenhouse. A lot of people think that we can't use compost soil since there might be pests or weed seeds in there. But as you can see, that wasn't an issue! Of course, it helps to use fast-growing vegetables that grow quicker than the weeds. Ha!

Read More: My 3 Best Tips on Picking a Grow Light

I'm putting the box underneath a grow light, preferably quite close to the leaves. Remember to move the light further up to keep your fast-growing vegetables from getting too close to it.

It's time to cut the leaves before the plants bolt! These fast-growing vegetables can bolt quite easily under a grow light. Especially if they grow this close together.

I could swear that I sowed the Color Crunch Blend from my own seed collection Sow All Year Round. But I get a little bit suspicious when I only see green leaves. There should be red ones in here too. That's what makes the seed mix so fun. Well, well. If you don't have access to a ready bok choy mix, then you can easily make your own. Most bok choy varieties germinate at around the same time if you sow them all together. The stages of development might differ later though, but that doesn't really matter to me since I'm going to grow these as microgreens.

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Why not give fast-growing vegetables like bok choy a try? If you sow them now, you can most likely harvest them already next month. Try it!
/Sara Bäckmo