Wednesday, June 25, 2014

Is "pot liquor" good for plants?

Vegetables for cooking in water


Q. I read at an organic gardening web site that vegetable water is really good for plants. Is that true?

A. This strikes me funny because vegetable water is often known as "pot liquor" or "pot likker." But I'll comment on that later.

Well, it appears the advisor is talking about water left over from boiling or steaming vegetables. If the water has cooled, it should be good. Don't pour hot water on your desirable plants. But why don't you use the vegetable water for yourself?

  • You can drink it when it has cooled enough;
  • You can mix it in your Bloody Veggie;
  • You can add it to smoothies;
  • You can use it as vegetable broth.

Where I come from, people who actually drink the vegetable water are considered desperate, and derisively called "pot lickers" or "pot likkers." But most everyone does it nowadays. Not just here.

If you have anything left after the smoothies and broths, give the rest to your plants. They should respond well.

Return to GoGardenNow.com.

1 comment:

Jean Campbell said...

When people speak now of the 'old days' and talk about 'all we had to eat was...' they usually name things that when I was a child we thought were good things to eat, like the juice where turnips were cooked eaten left over with corn bread crumbled in, or buttermilk. I know we were not in desperate circumstances; we had cows and chickens and pigs and always vegetables.

In the midst of north Georgia winters, Mama would go on the south side below a field terrace and scratch out a bed in the sun for fresh things like early lettuce, radishes and onions.