There is no "best". It all varies according to your weather, work area, sun, habits and so on. Since you're trying two different methods at once, you're going to get better results from one over the other, and so you're off! I use peat pellets because once I tried them I got very good results and so stopped trying other things. I have tried garden dirt for sprouting, had lousy results, and won't try that again, but YMMV.

Link below is to several previous discussions of this question. Just scroll down to the ones with the blue borders to read through them for many suggestions.

There in no "best" and everyone has their personal favorites. Personally I use ProMix BX which is one of the most frequently recommended for a number of reasons. But most any soil-less potting mix - and there are many of them available - will work.

Dave

Here is a link that might be useful: Seed starting mix discussions

I use promix… They carry it at my local garden supply center. It's highly compressed, a little goes a long way. Here is a video tutorial of making soil blocks, if you haven't tried it, I think it's a great and effective system if you are willing to do some work up front.

Here is a link that might be useful: my garden

Yikes....give me my plastic inserts and flats any time!

lol... I do a LOT of seeds, and space wise, the soil blocks are most efficient, (for me) but I can imagine they seem overwhelming if you have another method you prefer!

I will say that they are also SUPER easy to plant out...