I AM always enlivened by a good chat with someone who passionately goes about their day doing what they love.

The energy that the affection for one's craft creates is inspiring and without doubt for me, worthy of sharing.

Yesterday, over the obligatory long coffee, swinging with abandon on a hammock chair, I chatted to Deanna Kotsopoulos about her devotion to all things miniature, edible and unusual. Deanna, whose Spanish-Italian-Greek heritage sees her hail from a long-line of market gardeners, has, as she likes to say, 'growing things in her blood'.

"I can put things in the ground and they just grow,” she said.

"I have always grown an over-abundance of edible goodies; it's just how it happens.”

Given her devotion, or addiction actually, to nurturing life and growth, the exploration into how Deanna could continue her family's tradition of food production led her to SPIN gardening.

Small plot intensive gardening - a process where a series of beds are planted and rotated intensively.

"And a little further research, beyond the so-hot-right-now growing regime of wheatgrass, I discovered micro-greens,” she smiled.

To be clear, a microgreen is not a sprout. A sprout is grown without light, in water only.

A microgreen is grown in soil with the goodness of the sun shining down - they are the first set of leaves of a plant.

"These little things have so much goodness , in fact they have 40 times as much nutrition as the grown plant,” said Deanna.

"They are flavourful, with unexpected tastes.

A self-described old fashioned gardener, Deanna has taken advice from her father, and applied it to her operation.

She prefers to use natural sunlight, tankwater only, organic seeds, soil and mulch are the minimum, believing much of the green's goodness comes direct from the sun.

"This is just a pretty cool thing to do each day. I love to see seeds germinate and shoots grow,” said Deanna.

"Weird is wonderful for me - I've just started growing edible flowers, there is some Egyptian Moroccan mint and the gorgeous Parisian carrot.”

Micro Market Garden takes direct orders via the Facebook page, or if you want to try before you buy then head to the Frog and Swallow Café in Allora.