Micro Greens

Chefs Created the Demand

 

 

Micro greens are baby greens, miniature vegetable plants that can be harvested when they reach 1 to 1-1/2 inches, complete with stem and leaves.  Sometimes they even have mini flowers.

 

Chefs Love Them!

 

 

David Sasuga, who runs Fresh Origins farm in San Marcos, California, the largest mini greens producer in the U.S., got into the business 18 years ago.

 

A chef from L'Auberge, an upscale restaurant in Del Mar, on San Diego's County Coast, stopped by the Sasuga nursery to pick up tomato plants.  While there, he happened to notice baby basil and exclaimed:

 

"We would love to use that in our restaurant!"

 

 

Chefs Across the Country

 

Word spread from the chef in Del Mar to chefs in San Diego, Los Angeles, and on and on, until today Fresh Origins ships across the country.  Plants harvested in the morning can decorate a plate in Boston the next day.

 

High-end restaurants delight their patrons with delicate, colorful, and tasty micro celery, cilantro, cucumber, mustard Dijon, tangerine lace, wasabi, and other miniature greens never before used in such creative ways to entice diners and tickle palates.

 

 

A Dramatic Addition for Restaurants

 

 

Sasuga describes the impact micro greens have on top restaurants:

 

 

Chefs, especially the high-end, white-table-cloth chefs, are constantly looking for something unique and interesting, and this was perfect for them.  They're flavorful and they look amazing.

 

 

How Restaurants Use Micro Greens

 

 

Chefs often top off a dish with the greens, adding color, texture, and flavor to cocktails, appetizers, soups, seafood, meat, and desserts.

 

 

Sasuga's daughter, Kelly, who helps market, sums up the "dramatic" impact, saying:

 

 

You eat with your eyes first!

 

 

What About Organic?

 

The feature article in the Food Section of the daily U-T San Diego (August 14, 2013) by Doug Williams, describing how Fresh Origins catapulted micro greens to prominence says nary a word as to whether the greens raised in the company's huge hothouses on its 24-acre property are cultivated organically.

 

Nevertheless, I feel that any movement fostering the eating of greens these days when obesity plagues enormous segments of our population, children as well as adults, contributes to our societal health!

 

Let us then all eat greens!

 

I say,

 

More Greens!

 

 

*   *   *