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We know you’re busy, but trust us, this is a fantastic way to cut down on meal prep time. Storing produce in water is also a stellar way to keep your fruits and vegetables fresh for longer and retain precious nutrients. Bonus – it cuts down on food waste and saves you money!

Here, we will take you through how to do it, what produce can and cannot be stored this way, timesaving meal ideas, and how to effortlessly REGROW (yes, you heard right) your produce in water. Let’s get started!

Get Ready - A Step by Step Guide

Mark it on your calendar – Dedicate just 30 minutes per week to your produce and you will be a veggie-storing pro in no time. Ideally this time will fall right after you have procured enough fresh vegetables to get you through the week (or two or three with this method!).

Mindfully Meal Plan – when harvested or purchasing your produce, have in mind a few of the meals you will be making in the next week or two. This will cut down on compost and help keep your fridge less cluttered with items you may not know what to do with.

Gather Your Produce – whether you just harvested a bounty from the garden or purchased a plethora of fresh produce at the farmer’s market, lay it all out on your (clean) counter and get ready to do some meal prep that the future you will thank you for!

Divide and Conquer – not all fruits and vegetables are created equal. Okay, well maybe they are created equally delicious and nutritious, but they do not all like to be stored the same way. Refer to the next section for specifics.

Get Your Jars and Containers Ready- a prepared chef is a happy chef. Lay out what you will need on the counter. Your fresh herbs, asparagus, Brussels sprouts, broccoli, cauliflower and celery will do best in open jars while your roots will do best in sealed containers but there is some wiggle room as you will see.

Find Your Water Source – your produce will soak up the water you give them, so be sure to bathe them in water you see fit to drink.

Pro Tip: Get your kids involved in the garden harvest or the farmer’s market hunt (if you don’t have any, borrow one – trust me, your mom friend will be delighted!). Not only is it a great opportunity to teach our future generation about caring for our planet, but they can also help with the harvest or carry your market basket!

Don’t Mess it Up: When you plan to bring your water-stored produce on the go, make sure you’ve got the right container! There’s nothing worse than opening your bag to find a water-soaked wallet. Use a glass container with a locking lid (test the lid ahead of time) or a mason jar with a tight-fitting lid for success.

The What and The How

Okay, here’s the nitty gritty, read through this and you’ll know just what to do.

Some fresh vegetables take to water-storing better than others. We don’t recommend water-storing:

Tomatoes

Eggplants

Fresh beans or peas in their pods

Squashes of any kind

Mushrooms

Onions

Garlic

The following vegetables love to be stored in water and here is how:

Tender Herbs: basil, cilantro, dill, mint, parsley, and tarragon

Trim the stems of each bunch, snipping off about a half inch. Fill jars halfway with water and place individual bunches of herbs in as you would a bouquet of flowers.

Roots: carrots, potatoes, radishes

Potatoes must be peeled and cut, carrots and radishes should be cleaned, and leaves removed, peeling and cutting is optional. Place in a jar or container, whatever they fit in best, and cover with water until submerged. Cover with a tight-fitting lid.

Leafy greens and other above ground vegetables: asparagus, beet greens, broccoli, Brussels sprouts (on stalk only), carrot greens, cauliflower, celery, green onions, kale, leeks, Swiss chard

These can be stored much like the tender herbs, but with less water. Two to three inches will do.

Most fruits can be stored, when peeled and cut, in water for at least a few hours, others do well for longer.

Refrigerate: all tender herbs except basil, all root vegetables, asparagus, broccoli, Brussels sprouts (on stalk only), cauliflower, celery, green onions, and leeks, and all fruits.

Leave on countertop: basil, beet greens, carrot greens, kale, and Swiss chard.

Pro Tip: If your fridge has space, refrigerating leafy greens will help them last even longer.

Never refrigerate water-stored basil, it will turn black and become fodder for the compost.

Don’t Mess it Up: If you do not use up your water-stored produce within a week, be sure to change out the water. Check on produce midweek, if the water is getting funky, change it out as needed.

Meal Plan Like a Pro with Water-Stored Vegetables

Okay, here we go. This is how all the prep will save you time. Remember how we mentioned meal planning in Chapter One? Great, so you’ve got some meals in mind then. Consider what vegetable combinations you will need for each meal and how you like the raw vegetables prepared. Here are some ideas to get you started:

Snacks for lunch bags

Cut up several servings of carrots and celery into matchsticks, combine in a container and submerge in water with a tight-fitting lid. When ready to use, simply pull them out and dry them on a paper towel.

Stir-fry Prep

Slice on the diagonal: peeled carrots, celery, and daikon radish (split lengthwise first if it is large)

Chop cauliflower into florets

Combine in a container and submerge in water with a tight-fitting lid. When ready to use, simply pull it out and put the amount you want to use on a paper towel to dry while you chop some onion and maybe some Bok choy or cabbage and you are ready to stir-fry!

Pro Tip: Use water to keep guacamole green! Pack down some fresh guac in a bowl, pressing out any air bubbles. Use paper towel to clean the rim, then gently pour a half inch of lukewarm water over it. Voila! Fresh guac for days! (Three to be exact – when kept in the fridge). Mix the water into the guacamole when you are ready to eat.

Don’t Mess it Up: Certain vegetables cannot be chopped up and submerged ahead of time such as leafy greens, asparagus, Brussels sprouts, or green onions. It is best to have these washed and water-stored, so they are ready to chop right before using.

Grow a Kitchen Scrap Garden

Repurpose your water-stored produce scraps to grow more food! This is another awesome way to save time and energy by combining meal prep and gardening without even leaving your kitchen.

This is a fun project for any age, but a wonderful opportunity to get kids into the kitchen. The more children engage in the full circle process of growing, storing, preparing, consuming, and composting fresh, whole, organic foods, the brighter the future of our planet will be.

Beets and Carrots

After trimming the greens off your beets and carrots, cut the tops from the roots where the greens sprouted from. Place them sprout-side up in a shallow dish of water, careful not to submerge and drown them, and wait a few days to a week. The greens should begin growing. Once they are large enough, harvest and store in water.

Celery

When you are preparing celery for water storage, cut the bottom two inches of the stocks off with the base intact. Place the base in a shallow dish of water, careful not to submerge, and wait a few days to a week. When new, leafy growth appears, plant the celery base in soil with the leaves above the surface. This is a good crop to plant in early spring, as celery does not grow well in the hot, dry months of summer.

Green onions

Take the trimmed, root ends of your green onions and plant root end down directly into potting soil, we like to use 3-inch seedling pots, but a start tray would work well too. Leave them in a bright kitchen window, keep them moist but not drowning, and they should sprout up quite quickly. This is an especially gratifying kitchen scrap crop because they grow so quickly, great for kids to see.

Pro Tip: Grab some organic potting soil and a dozen 3-inch pots next time you’re out. Keep them on hand in your pantry to pot up your repurposed kitchen scraps when they are ready to go. The kids will love playing with dirt in the kitchen! Another tip? Pot up the starts in the sink for easy clean up!

Don’t Mess it Up: Don’t waste time, if you don’t see sprouts shooting up on your kitchen scraps after a week or so, it’s time to throw the scraps in the compost and try again.