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Edible Houseplants

July 14th, 2014

A year or so ago I read Growing Tasty Tropical Plants in Any Home, Anywhere: (like lemons, limes, citrons, grapefruit, kumquats, sunquats, tahitian oranges, barbados … black pepper, cinnamon, vanilla, and more…) and I loved it. I’ve had lemon trees for quite a while, but after reading this book I wanted to grow a few other things. Thanks to this book I found Logee’s Greenhouse, they specialize in edible houseplants, these are dwarf varieties of plants that do well in pots and produce fruit at a much smaller size than their normal counterparts.
tropical houseplants 1
tropical houseplants 2
What did I get? A black fig, dwarf avocado, dwarf banana, dwarf mango, meyer lemon and a dwarf guava.
tropical houseplants 3
tropical houseplants 4
I potted up most of them already, the banana I might plant in the back garden and dig it up this fall. Hopefully I’m on my way to producing delicious tropical fruit in my windowsills. I’ll keep you posted on how they do.

Do you grow any edible houseplants?

9 Comments to “Edible Houseplants”
  1. Robin on July 14, 2014 at 5:35 am

    I grow herbs indoors but no fruit yet. I’ve thought of ordering lime, lemon and orange trees. My daughter started lemon and orange trees from seeds but it’s unlikely they’ll produce fruit. We’ll see. They’re only six inches tall. hmm…should place an order before the weather gets cold.

    Reply to Robin's comment

  2. Adelina on July 14, 2014 at 7:10 am

    We have a lemon tree that doesn’t produce any lemons, a blood orange tree that is doing quite well – there are 4 oranges on it now, a bay leaf tree (its still a baby) and a little mint plant that I keep inside only for mojitos.
    Thank you for the link – I have been wanting another tree in the house. Only I can’t decide on which one.

    Reply to Adelina's comment

  3. Tom @ Raise Your Garden on July 14, 2014 at 7:46 am

    Well, I used to buy those lemon and lime trees from the airport (why don’t they sell those anymore?)

    But your pics of your little plants blew me away. Now I want some soooo badly.

    Reply to Tom @ Raise Your Garden's comment

  4. Misti on July 14, 2014 at 8:21 am

    I’m lucky to live in a zone where my tropical edibles, at least most of them, can stay outside. We bring a few things in during the winter that are more cold sensitive, or leave a few things such as bananas outside to die back.If it gets too low we’ll throw blankets on our citrus, but for the most part they do ok.

    Reply to Misti's comment

  5. bonnie knox on July 14, 2014 at 8:54 am

    I have a couple of key lime plants, grown from seed. One has bloomed and set fruit, but I don’t have enough light indoors in winter for them to mature.

    Reply to bonnie knox's comment

  6. Nebraska Dave on July 14, 2014 at 9:30 am

    Susy, house plants and I just don’t play together well. The house is just not designed to have houseplants. The previous owner had some hanging ones in the corner of the rooms but still the trees in the yard and the window placement are not convenient to growing inside house plants. My cultivation efforts remains outside. My grand mother had the little lemon trees so I’m guessing this is not a modern day thing. I’m sure they will grow wonderfully well for you.

    Have a great edible houseplant day.

    Reply to Nebraska Dave's comment

  7. Texan on July 14, 2014 at 5:06 pm

    I grow all different citrus in pots outside. I bring them into the garage in the winter as they out grew my little green house. We have fluorescent lights in the garage so they like that. Usually our garage stays well above freezing as its insulated really well. I can put a space heater in there if I have to. How do indoor plants get pollinated? I see bees all over my trees outside. I assumed that is how they are pollinated? I have a kumquat which always make super well. Mandarins, Limes, grapefruit, lemons and a loquat.

    Reply to Texan's comment

    • Susy on July 14, 2014 at 7:03 pm

      I will put mine outside in the summer, they can get pollinated that way. We have enough flies, ladybugs and other insects inside that things seem to get pollinated.

      Reply to Susy's comment

  8. Wendy on July 15, 2014 at 12:14 am

    Another interesting adventure!–I wish we had the space and lighting to do this . . . maybe someday!

    Reply to Wendy's comment

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This is a daily journal of my efforts to cultivate a more simple life, through local eating, gardening and so many other things. We used to live in a small suburban neighborhood Ohio but moved to 153 acres in Liberty, Maine in 2012.

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