The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Community => Coffee Lounge => Topic started by: MAK on January 25, 2014, 01:56:56 pm
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I had to go and buy more wine today and see that they have a massive range of seed potatoes, shallots, garlic and onion sets.
They are also selling 2.5 kg of spuds for €1.45 and 10kg of onions for €2.20 - sure grow your own is best but maybe not economical.
They were also selling pork in bulk at rear quarter € 3.20/kg and fore quarter at €2.60/kg
fortunately I have plenty of time to plant and harvest in bulk but the above prices does make me wonder if I should just buy onions and spuds as I need them rather than have the work of harvesting, prep and then storing spuds and onions - let alone clearing the stores out each summer.
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economically
spuds and onions are always cheaper in the shop, when i still had a veg patch (i miss it) i grew a few crops of salad potato's as they can't be beat fresh from the garden, but otherwise concentrated on growing crops that cost more in the shops or i couldn't buy in the varieties I wanted.
carrots, beetroots, various salad leaves, good runner beans, etc...
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salad is expensive here - £1 a small bag, thats what i would grow. but maybe that is cheap in france too.
mainly though i havent found anything iv done on the farm that is cheaper than i can buy in a supermarket, whether veg or meat, even wool etc.
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Cost is not even on my list of reasons to grow veg .
I don't think supermarkets can really be beaten on that score for most stuff , i want my food free of chemicals , but i can't afford to buy everything organically grown .
My land has never had chems put on it , ( i know the man who used to own it . He didn't put anything on it , nor did his dad . That covers over 90 years ) , so apart from what falls out of the sky , my own veg is very clean (chem free) and i eat it within hours of harvest , mainly .
So chem free , gm free and fresh , that's enough for me , although saving few £ would be good .
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The market where we sell most of our pork is in a town of about 5000 people that has 5 supermarkets. None of them more than 5 minutes walk away. The people who come to buy food at the market do so because they want to know exactly what they're buying and where it's come from. We can't hope to compete with the supermarkets on price but we can beat the sh1t out of them on quality and provenance.
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Spuds main crop downside is they take up a lot of room that could be used to grow other stuff, salad spuds grown in a barrel picked and eaten fresh , cant be bettered.
ANOTHER GOOD REASON FOR GROWING YOUR OWN STUFF , MONSANTO AGAIN
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I'm very limited in space and ability so I don't grow anything that I can buy cheaply. I suppose it depends on how much space you have available and how much time you want to put into it. And allow for Monsanto and their ilk.
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it is a shame that all that effort of raising meat/vegcosts more than going to the supermarket. ???
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What about all the FREE extra protein we get with our home grown lettuces? Slugs, earwigs beetles etc :roflanim:
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Today 2.5 kg of big potatoes cost us £1.69 the 70 mm dia onions were 89 p per pack of five .
Were I fit enough and had more grow space I'd be growing my own spuds & onions not only for quality but also for virtually being chemical free and allowed to grow naturally not being driven to grow by constant daily artificial watering which makes the cells big and gritty instead of tight and not gritty .
We've finished our six strings of onions so have had to resort to the tasteless shop ones.
Like folks are saying grow what is expensive in your shops and grow stuff that you like that is not in the shops .
I'm into home deep freezing , pressure caning , hot water processing , dehydrating 7b hot and cold smoking our own foods , so what ever can come direct for the garden when at optimum processing conditions is fantastic It has also saved us a fair bit since I started late last year .
I'm looking forward to being able to cure and cold smoke our own hams etc. and then air dry them assisted with a very low heat source and a fan in a humidity controlled shed.
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I buy main crop spuds by the sack from farm shop at £6.50....why spend £2 on a tiddly bag in super market? .... and absolutely no point in growing them myself.... I grow earlies (yum).
This will be our second year here so plans to plant lots of stuff if it ever stops raining!
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I try to grow things I really like and that are always expensive. Tomatoes (16 times the flavour), asparagus, salsify, strawberries, raspberries, banana shallots. Lamb's lettuce was a revelation - always so expensive in the supermarket but I just leave a few plants to run to seed every year and it starts growing in October. I have a bed of it out there now (just growing where the seed landed) on ground that would otherwise be bare. It's frost-proof, insect and disease proof and gives me saladstuff all Winter.
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I'm sadly obsessive about growing.....with mixed results I admit but I don't let that put me off. I gently persuade my OH into planting all sorts...he generally does the potato earthing and stuff we have learnt to grow the stuff we like and use rather than so many obscurities regardless of supermarket costs.....I guess like others we know its chemical free fresher and imo tastier.....even the spuds....he's convinced now...at last....after a cracking crop of first earlies and salad potatoes good maincrop just not the right variety I think
I haven't bought veg of any description save the odd swede and salad cues/toms after the decimation of mine by caterpillars in the poly since the last growing season....still have potatoes carrots broccoli sprouts cauli 2 types of kale cropping :thumbsup:
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The cheap stuff is grown with a high level of automation. Things that need a high level of manual labour to grow and harvest are very expensive here. We used to grow our own potatoes in the UK, if only to keep the veg plot covered and weed free. The cost of the seeds here is ridiculous and onion sets cost double the price of the finished item in the supermarket!
As suggested MAK, perhaps best to concentrate on the items that you are growing on equal terms with the commercial producers -the high labour content stuff.
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Money cant buy the pleasure I get from growing my own veg. I enjoy the planning, planting and harvesting so much.
Things like a butternut squash that I am convinced costs me less than 5p to grow costs many times more than that in a supermarket.
So even if the basics, spuds etc are cheaper to buy - balancing out the costs of the trip i dont need to make and the quality of the produce theres no competition.
I only buy from the supermarket when I run out - which isnt too often.
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I agree whole heartedley with those who champion home grown for the reasons above. There is very little we buy in a supermarket as we have plenty of space and time to grow, store, preserve,freeze,cure etc. we even dry kidney beans and harricot blanc !
I guess my reaction to supermarket prices may be related to me having to do the lion share of all the work becuase of the OH's serious RTA. Maybe this year was just not as pleasurable but a chore. I have had to plough up the spuds and lift carrots with a tractor, dry them then lug them to the cellar - that and home killing then butchering of 3 pigs (hams,pate,bacon and sausages), 20 or so ducks, 5 cockeralls and 22 rabbits have left me shattered.
yep - the pleasure element was defineteley missing this year but that said I have no plans to buy more from the supermarkets.
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I cannot see the point of growing maincrop tatties as they ALWAYS get killed by blight - and so if I would want to grow them I would have to resort to spraying too... so I buy either 20kg bags at the greengrocer (but they were 6.50 a couple of year ago, it's now nearer 10) or the 7.5kgs ones in Lidl (usually much better quality and Scottish ones too).
But do grow as much as I can, just because we do prefer the homegrown stuff... polytunnel is a godsend!