Avoiding the Gentrification of Sustainability - Part 2: Grow Your Own
This past weekend, my husband and I put the finishing touches on this year’s vegetable garden, and I have to say – I’m VERY excited! One of my favorite parts of the weather getting warmer is knowing that at a moment’s notice, I can run outside and grab all the ingredients I need for a quick salad. I’ve been growing my own vegetables the better part of my adult life, and it’s something I’ve always genuinely enjoyed and found relaxing. Even better, it slashes my grocery bill in half! Although the cost of setting up a garden can be a bit steep, the payoff, both financially and nutritionally is well worth it! Here are some ways you can reduce waste and save money by growing your own food…
Seed your greens. Even if you have a black thumb, there are some plants that are next to impossible to kill. Leafy greens have always been easiest for me, and even better, they do best when started from seeds! Greens can typically tolerate a little bit of frost, so I get mine started outside in mid-March (I’m in Zone 6a). You can sow the seeds directly into the ground, if you are not blessed with much space in your back yard, they do great in containers as well since the roots don’t go very deep. Once seeded, all you need to do is water, and in just a few weeks, you’ll have more garden-fresh salads than you can eat! The same idea goes for spinach, kale, chard, arugula, and more!
A head of iceberg lettuce costs around $1.50 at the grocery store. Let’s say you buy a head every week. That’s about $78 per year. Now, if we take out the months in which lettuce can grow outside (April – September if you’re in my zone), although you can grow it pretty easily indoors too, that cuts your lettuce budget in HALF for the cost of a packet of seeds, which is usually around $3.00.
Now let’s extrapolate that out to some of the other, hardier greens. One thing I love about growing kale and spinach is that they freeze really well. So, throughout the gardening season, I periodically pop some freshly washed and dried greens into the freezer for use all year round. So let’s say you buy a bag of spinach and a bag of kale every other week. These cost about $2.99 each, which brings us to around $155 annually. For the cost of a packet of seeds for each vegetable (around $6 total), we save almost $150 a year, AND avoid all the excess plastic that come with these bagged greens. So, in greens alone, we are saving nearly $200 annually.
Use preservation techniques for veggies all year. In our kale and spinach example, freezing greens saves $150 annually, but greens are not the only things we can freeze, and freezing is not the only preservation technique we can use to save veggies for the colder months. Herbs also freeze extremely well. I really like to chop them while they’re fresh and freeze in an ice cube tray with olive oil. I cook with herbs nearly every day. If I had to pay the $0.99 per bunch, I’d be spending another $50 - $100 per year.
Pickling is another great option to extend the life of your produce, and it’s so simple! For a long time, I thought pickles were specific to cucumbers, but I’ve recently experimented with all sorts of root vegetables as well. Beets are particularly delicious, and jalapenos are a fantastic addition to nachos or your favorite veggie burger!
Finally, jams and sauces are a great way to save some of your more delicate produce. You can use your extra tomatoes to make a giant batch of marinara that you can either can or freeze, and an excess of apples can make a year’s supply of applesauce. Jams are also incredibly easy to transform produce that’s past its prime. Simply add a splash of come sort of acid (vinegar for savory, lemon juice for sweet) and the seasonings of your choice to your fruit and cook it in a pot over low heat until it breaks down and reduces. You’ll never have to use store-bought sauce or jam again! (Saving another $250 or so annually)
Upcycle your containers. This concept applies to both containers for gardening AND containers for canning. You know the phrase “one man’s trash is another man’s treasure”? Forget that. Make your trash your OWN treasure. Salsa jars are an excellent vessel for jam or pickled veggies. Cut a side out of an empty orange juice carton to make a planter for greens. Not only are these free alternatives for mason jars or plant pots you could buy, but you’re also reducing waste!