Microgreens Provide More Vitamins Than Full Grown Leafy Greens

Microgreens Provide More Vitamins Than Full Grown Leafy Greens

Baby spinach and baby lettuce are de rigeur in every grocery store, but a new study says that even younger greens might give us more nutritional benefits. Enter microgreens. These tiny leaves that are less than 14 days old can provide people with lots and lots of nutrients, possibly even more than baby or full-size varieties of leafy greens.

The study, conducted by USDA researched Gene Lester at the University of Maryland College Park, looked at 25 different varieties of very young greens, aka microgreens. The results, published in the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, are pretty amazing.  Researchers found that microgreens generally had four to size times the amounts of vitamins as fully mature greens of the same plant. That means tiny little baby leaves, which have barely been exposed to sunlight, can potentially provide people with large amounts of vitamin C, vitamin E, and beta carotene.