Frugal Friday: Grow Your Own Food and Grow Your Savings

Today over at LifeasMOM, FishMama wrote about making the most of seasonal produce for her Frugal Friday series. I thought I would share about how we save money by growing a lot of our food. My husband and I are big believers in producing our own food. We do it primarily because we love to grow things, but saving a bundle of money is a very nice bonus.

What's Our Garden Like?

At the end of May I wrote about putting in this year's garden and how we are using a new weed free gardening technique. I am delighted to report that a month and a half later our garden is still virtually weed free and the plants are all coming along very nicely. So this year, we are not only saving money, we are spending very little of our free time to grow our own fruits and vegetables.

We live on a small country property where there is plenty of room to grow a wide variety of produce. If you live on a small city lot, do not be discouraged. For many years I lived in the city and found ways to grow lots of tasty vegetables -- I grew them all along the fence and in the foundation beds around the house. Take heart, it can be done!

A lot of our produce comes from our large farm garden. Sure, we still buy lots of produce at the store, (especially this time of year, before our produce is ripe) but we also grow quite a bit ourselves, which adds up to quite a good cost savings. In a month, we won't be shelling out a dime for tomatoes, green beans, beets, cucumbers, sweet corn, peas, onions or peppers. The extras will be prepared for storage so we can eat them over the winter. You can read about how we store onions here. We also share lots of our extras with family and friends.

Other Ways We Get Fresh Produce

In addition to our garden, we also rely on our mulberry trees, blackberry thickets, walnut trees, and rhubarb patch for a harvest that comes up to several hundred dollars worth of produce. We use the fruit to make all kinds of desserts and jam. The extras are frozen for later use and shared with friends. We have many black walnut trees on our property and each year, I'll collect a bucket full of the nuts, clean and crack them them open so the nutmeats can be picked out and stored. Black Walnuts are great to eat plain, but are also delicious in baked goods.

We are also blessed by many of my husband's customers that generously share their bounty with us. Many times in the fall, George will come home with a sack of pears or a bucket of apples. With something like this we will eat all we can fresh and then I make up the rest into desserts for the freezer or jam.

What about Meat?

It is possible to grow/hunt/catch your own meat for much less than it is to buy it. Plus you usually get a much better product. Hunting or catching your own meat is by far the cheapest method; it also nets you some of the lowest fat meat -- even the "fatty" cuts of meat are not fatty in game.

Here's a real life example:
Last night we ate a pound and a half of Walleye fillets that cost us nothing. My Father-in-law gave the fish to us, because we didn't have very good luck on our fishing trip. If we paid this week's sale price it would've cost us $11.98.

Here's another example: my oldest sister has 7 children and cost of milk was getting to be astronomical. Now, all their milk comes from a herd of goats. They've ran the numbers; the cost of maintaining the herd is far less than buying cow's milk from the store. Plus, they use the extra milk to make Goat's Milk Soap to sell.

Another sister and her family all hunt and fish. For about $100 worth in license fees, they get several hundred dollars worth of wild turkey, wild boar, venison, phesant and fish to feed their family. These meats are all natural, organic, and low fat -- healthier than most meat you could ever buy in the store. George and I are recipients of the generosity of my sister and her husband. We always look forward to a few dinners of roast pheasant every time they go on a hunt.

How Much Money Do We Really Save?

We've never kept any kind of a record of how much money we save by growing a portion of our food. A good rule of thumb to calculate the savings from using your own produce is to look at what you are eating at a particular meal and note how much it would cost you if you bought the item at the grocery store. For example: This week I used 4 cups of blackberries and 2 cups of rhubarb to make this dessert. Even at sale prices, this fruit would've cost me close to $10.

When calculating the savings from growing, raising, catching, hunting your own food, it is really important to factor in what it costs you to produce your own food. It is entirely possible to spend a fortune on your garden, your livestock and hunting and fishing licenses (and equipment). You could easily end up spending far more to produce your own food than you would spend if you bought everything from a store.

However, many people that produce a good share of their own food, look upon the task as a quality of life issue. Even if it costs more, they would still do it because they enjoy doing it, because it's become a hobby.

George and I are not big spenders when it comes to producing our own food. We don't go all out, nor do we buy all the latest gadgets that commercials tell us we need. Our costs are surprisingly low. Just now I did a quick estimate of what we pay to put in and keep up our garden, our fishing and hunting licenses and related supplies each year. It comes in at just under $300, which is far less than the value we receive in return. It's not all about the money we save, either. We get to enjoy lots of fresh air and exercise as we work together on a common goal. We also enjoy being able to bless others with the fruits of our labors.