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The Most Bang For Your Buck: Homegrown Vegetables — 12 Comments

  1. We will be starting our own square foot garden soon and we are excited about that. One of my earliest childhood memories is digging potatoes with my Grandaddy, so I did love that picture that you included today. It seemed magical to me that the dirt could produce food! 🙂

    • I have the same memory with my Dad. There is something very magical about harvesting potatoes (and carrots too.) It’s like opening a present. You’ll have to let me know how the square foot gardening goes for you. I have really enjoyed ours and plan on adding another 4×4 square next year.

  2. I’ve been considering starting my own square foot garden. My mom has always had different gardens -fruits/veggies and flowers- and I’ve always enjoyed the different fruits and veggies we’ve gained through that but I’ve never done it for myself. I do a lot of cooking and it’s nice when I can use items that were pulled from my own backyard. We have a couple of basil plants that I pick from pretty often and that definitely beats purchasing basil in store where it gets pretty pricey for a small amount of product.
    I really like these “cost effective” posts!

    • I’m glad someone else enjoys the odd variety of things I cost analyze. Beryl I think you’d really enjoy having your own small garden. I bet you know a guy that could get you some lumber if you decided to do a raised bed garden. I’m right there with you on the herbs. Fresh herbs are staggeringly expensive for something that will go bad in a week or so. Thanks for commenting!

  3. I so strongly agree with you about most of your top picks. Give me spinach, squash, okra, tomatoes, and onions and I’ll give you a different dish every day for at least 2 months! I do understand the lack of cost effectiveness w/ tomatoes, but no store bought ones compare to the taste of homegrown (due largely to the time from ripe to table, having been picked to ripen enroute, but losing flavor for being picked early). Give me those home grown selections ANY day of the week! BTW this Alton Smith guy? Sort of the PeeWee Herman of food? He didn’t mention my favorite way to eat okra: boiled w/ real butter (a little) and salt!

    • Haha Ted! Alton Brown is more like the Mr. Wizard of food science. But I can see the whole Pee Wee Herman thing with all his props and bits. Two months of recipes eh? That is a lot of variety.

  4. Good analysis Jon. I am growing tomatoes, bell peppers, banana peppers, blueberries, strawberries, and satsumas right now. I also have a juvenile mango and avocado tree that I am starting out. Cost-wise, I would do much better going to the grocery, there is no doubt in my mind. The learning curve has been steep and expensive 🙂 But the learning process for my kids and I has been invaluable.

    • Thanks Chris! That’s awesome that you have a mango and an avocado tree. We could save some real money with an avocado tree. I had to look up satsumas…didn’t realize it was a type of mandarin. Those would be great to have as well! Sounds like you have quite the garden/orchard going! And you’re right, the best value is teaching your kids about where real food comes from!

  5. I think another factor is personal preference–I am more than happy to work hard to have a good green bean harvest, because I like homecanned green beans so much better than anything I can buy. And now that we made 5 GALLONS of homemade salsa last year, my husband turns up his nose at the store bought kind. So…we are officially spoiled. 😀 I do take into consideration how expensive a vegetable is in the store, when I’m deciding what to grow–that’s why we grow spinach, sugar snap peas, and okra. And have you ever priced fresh shelled purple hull peas! Super expensive!

    • 5 gallons of salsa?!? How many tomatoes did you grow??? I should have probably said something about purple hull peas. We have some in our garden for that very reason…they are crazy expensive.

  6. The other problem with potatoes is that, depending on your soil type, then can taste like, well, dirt. NJ soil is great for tomatoes but produces the worse tasting potatoes I’ve ever had.

    • I hadn’t thought about that Edward…that is a very good point! I really appreciate all your good comments on my posts!