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Caring For Basil Properly: This Is How The Kitchen Herb From The Supermarket Lives Almost Forever

With the right care, basil will last forever. Just follow these tips to keep your herbs fresh and harvest basil regularly.

  • Basil can be bought fresh in a pot in the supermarket or organic market.
  • So that the herb pot lasts as long as possible, you should repot the plants.
  • The most common mistake in basil care: waterlogging in the pot.

Basil from the supermarket looks fresh and delicious. But after a few weeks, the plants usually drop their leaves or are attacked by a fungus. That doesn’t have to be the case: we’ll explain how to properly care for and harvest your kitchen basil.

Caring for basil: transplanting new herbs

There are usually too many basil plants in a herb pot from the supermarket. This has negative consequences: the herbs cannot form roots and have to compete for nutrients. The first thing you should do to take care of basil is to repot the plants after you bought them.

Fill two to three flower pots with potting soil. We recommend peat-free soil.
Remove dead leaves to prevent fungal infestation.
Carefully remove the smaller basil plants from the pot without damaging the roots. In the end, no more than ten stems should be left in the pot.
Now transplant the young basil plants into the other flower pots.

The right basil care – in three steps

Basil requires little care. To keep your kitchen herbs healthy, you simply have to follow these tips:

Place the basil on a light window sill. The room temperature should be at least 15 degrees.
Water the basil regularly. However, only give him water sparingly. Basil does not tolerate waterlogging.
Be careful not to wet the leaves with irrigation water. This can promote mold diseases.
Fertilize the basil with an organic fertilizer about every two weeks. For example, put some compost in the pot.

Harvesting and cutting basil: Here’s how to do it

Regularly cut back or pluck off the top basil shoots. This will prevent the basil from blooming and eventually wilting.

When harvesting basil, favor the lower leaves. These are usually the largest and taste very aromatic. You also prevent the leaves from touching the damp soil – this prevents mold.

Avoid pesticides: you should pay attention to this

Herbs are for cooking. Therefore, do not care for basil with chemical fertilizers or pesticides.

Unfortunately, many basil plants are already contaminated with chemicals in the supermarket. For example, the consumer advice center warns against buying fresh herbs from overseas. These usually contain a lot of pesticide residues.

In organic farming, on the other hand, chemical-synthetic pesticides and fertilizers are completely forbidden. That’s why we recommend kitchen herbs from organic farming.

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Written by John Myers

Professional Chef with 25 years of industry experience at the highest levels. Restaurant owner. Beverage Director with experience creating world-class nationally recognized cocktail programs. Food writer with a distinctive Chef-driven voice and point of view.

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