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I accidentally left this basil outside on a cold windy night that seems to have bruised its leaves. What should be done for this plant? Any help appreciated.

Yes basil’s tender leaves are prone to damage especially when not sufficiently hardened/acclimated to the outside elements. It’s also best to protect from temperatures colder than ... I would say about 50°F

I would clip off all leaves that you would consider too damaged to eat. Whether you want to trim and save good parts of the leaves are up to you. Pinch/clip off the top bud so new pair of leaf buds will grow.

If tender tips had been damaged, cut to just above a healthy pair of leaves.

...I had to rush outside and bring in my lettuce, cabbage, kale, and artichoke seedlings/starts earlier around 7:30pm — I forgot about them and it’s going to get down to low-20’s overnight here.

As long as no stems were snapped, it should be OK. However, it looks like there are several plants per pot, and I would thin them out, as that pot (though I can't tell the size) might be large enough for one, but not a bunch of them.

Once the plants grow some new growth on them, trim the leaves with brown on them, or if they brown entirely.

Where are you located?

I’m located in Athens, GA. Here’s another pic to give you an idea the size of the pot. By thinning them out do you mean transplanting a few plants or just snipping some out? Pretty new at this so any advice appreciated.

Good point pepperhead212. Basil will get big enough you would need to limit to 1 plant per minimum 8” pot — 10-12” would be better.

It looks like some of those — very young ...likely bunch of seedlings — may have been too damaged anyway and this will make culling easier. Clip those at soil level, get rid of browned leaves which will not recover, wait another day to see if more will show damage... then I would start by slipping the entire rootball out of this pot and dividing in 4 pieces to start with. If they are too tangled, easiest to just take a kitchen knife, slip the blade between the stems and cut into 4-6 pieces like a cake. Then re-plant the pieces in bigger pots. Some of them will die from having too cut off from their roots. That’s OK.

Kcirremekaj; I agree about the overcrowding of your basil. I don't grow in pots but raised beds. For what it's worth, two good-size plants are about enough for my wife & me throughout the year - eating plus freezing or drying leaves for winter use. We love the flavour of basil in many dishes & sandwiches but four plants would be big overkill for the two of us. I keep pinching out so that plants bush out to produce more stems & leaves, and especially don't let flowers develop until I'm ready to harvest seed for next season.