Benefits of MicroGreens: It’s Not The Size That Counts

Jan 23, 2024nate

With the busy and active lives we tend to live these days, making sure you’re eating well and getting your essential doses of vitamins and nutrients can often be difficult. Many people turn to dietary supplements, but these can be both expensive and often have questionable ingredient lists. Microgreens offer a healthy and natural way to incorporate nutritious veggies into your diet, plus they’re fun to grow and perfect for beginner gardeners!

In this blog we’ll be sharing some of the primary health benefits of microgreens, and if you’d like to learn more about how to grow them, the options available, as well as tips and tricks for incorporating them into your diet feel free to check our separate blogs that cover these topics and more.

Why Are Microgreens Healthy?

There’s a few qualities of homegrown microgreens that come together to result in their designation as a ‘superfood’. First, they are nutrient dense – meaning they are concentrated sources of vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants. Compared to their adult counterparts, they contain upto 40x the vitamins (Source) and a broader spectrum of antioxidants (Source).

Second, they are suitable to eat raw which helps them retain their nutrients, as the high heat in cooking can destroy enzymes, vitamins and phytonutrients (source).

Finally, when homegrown, they’re fresh! As soon as any plant is harvested, it starts to lose its nutrients. For example, spinach loses 90% of its Vitamin C within 24 hours of harvesting (source). When you harvest moments before eating, you ensure that you’re getting all of the nutrients of the living plant.

Microgreens are a good source of…

Each microgreen variety had its own ensemble of good stuff, but generally speaking, microgreens are a great way to get your vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants. These are the raw materials that your body uses to perform hundreds of actions every day – from making your skin glow, to healing wounds and shoring up your bones. You’ll also often read they are “high in fiber” and while this is technically true on a percent basis, fiber is really about total volume so you’re better off with big veggies there.

Vitamins: These are organic substances made by plants or animals. Microgreens tend to be rich in vitamin C, vitamin E and carotenoids (which arent vitamins themselves, but are used by our body to make vitamin A) (source).
Minerals: These originally come from the earth and water & are than absorbed by plants and stored in their seeds and plant mass. The minerals microgreens tend to be the richest in are potassium, iron, zinc, magnesium and copper (2, 3).
Antioxidants: Antioxidants counteract unstable molecules that damage our bodies cells and DNA. One category of antioxidants, called polyphenols, is abundantly rich in brassica microgreens – like our Red Russian Kale – with samples containing 164 unique types (source). Another category of antioxidants, called carotenoids, were found to be about 5 times greater in microgreens than adult leaves (source).