Growing Herbs in Pots on a Kitchen Windowsill

Why the kitchen windowsill is the best spot in the house

Every keen cook eventually works out that the best place for herbs is not a neat row in the garden but a slightly chaotic cluster of pots beside the sink. A windowsill gives you three things at once: light, warmth and proximity. Herbs grown there get picked while you are cooking, which means they get used, and herbs that get used keep producing. A supermarket bunch of basil, bought, forgotten and turned to slime in the fridge, is an expensive way to cook. A living plant that surrenders a few leaves at a time costs about the same and lasts for months.

There is a cosy side to it too. A sill of green leaves softens even the most practical kitchen, and gives you something to look at while the kettle boils.

Which herbs to grow, and what to leave behind

Plenty of herbs are sold as kitchen plants. Only some are genuinely happy indoors. Start with these three.

• Basil is the easiest to love and the thirstiest. It wants heat, strong light and regular water. One plant in a 15cm pot keeps a household in leaves from late spring to early autumn. Pinch the growing tips and it bushes out instead of running up into a leggy stalk.
• Mint is almost impossible to kill, which is both a virtue and a warning. It spreads by underground runners, so give it its own pot or it will colonise the neighbourhood. Spearmint is the one for cooking.
• Parsley is slow from seed, so buy a plant and pot it on. Flat-leaved parsley has the better flavour. It likes cooler, damper conditions than basil, so keep the two apart on the sill.

Beyond those, chives are tidy and reliable, coriander bolts quickly indoors but is worth sowing in succession, and thyme and rosemary survive but resent the dry air of a heated room — treat them as short-term guests. Avoid tight, root-bound clumps; split them into separate pots straight away.

Pots, compost and a sensible start

Use pots with drainage holes and always a saucer underneath. Around 15-20cm across is right for one supermarket plant; anything smaller dries out twice a day in summer. Terracotta looks lovely but wicks water away fast, so plastic or glazed pots are kinder if you are forgetful.

Fill with a peat-free multipurpose compost lightened with a handful of grit or perlite per pot, so the roots get air. Leave a centimetre of space below the rim for watering. Tease the roots out gently when you pot up rather than cramming the plant in, firm the compost with your fingers, water it in and let it drain before standing it on the sill.

Watering and light: where most windowsill herbs fail

Water when the top centimetre of compost feels dry — push a finger in rather than guessing. In summer that may be daily; in January, perhaps once a week. Basil flops dramatically at the first sign of thirst and usually recovers within an hour of a drink, but repeated wilting weakens it.

Give them the brightest spot you have. A south or west-facing sill is ideal; turn the pots a quarter-turn each week so they grow straight rather than leaning at the glass. Watch for two kitchen hazards: a radiator directly beneath the sill, which cooks the roots, and a gap in the curtains on a frosty night, which can blacken tender growth.

Feeding, pinching and picking for a long season

From spring to early autumn, feed with a liquid plant food every fortnight, diluted to half the strength on the bottle. Beyond that, the main job is regular harvesting.

• Basil: pinch out the top pair of leaves just above a leaf joint, and two shoots will grow where one was. Never take more than a third of the plant at once, and remove flower buds as soon as they appear.
• Parsley: cut the outer stems at the base, leaving the centre to keep growing. Snip rather than tug.
• Mint: cut whole stems above a pair of leaves. The more you cut, the more it bushes.
• Chives: snip a few stems at a time, about 2cm from the base.

Little and often is the rule. A few leaves from several plants beats stripping one bare.

Keeping things going through the colder months

Light is the limiting factor from October onwards, so growth slows and plants turn pale and spindly. Ease off the feed, water less and move pots to the brightest sill you have. Don't panic if a basil plant looks tired by November: take 10cm cuttings, strip the lower leaves, stand them in a glass of water on the sill and they will root in a fortnight.

Check the undersides of leaves weekly for greenfly and whitefly, and wash any you find off with a gentle spray of water. Small black flies hovering above the compost are fungus gnats, usually a sign of overwatering — let the surface dry out between drinks.

Above all, keep picking. A windowsill of herbs is not a display, it is a larder, and the more it gets raided the better it looks.