Monday, June 7, 2010

50 Healthy Foods...

Found this article the other day and was duly impressed with the info it contained:
http://www.thedailygreen.com/living-green/blogs/save-money/cheap-healthy-food-460610#comments

Jeff Yeager is a very funny and pragmatic man that writes the column The Green Cheapskate for The Daily Green, an e-zine also called, The Consumer's Guide to the Green Revolution. The article linked here is called 50 Healthy Foods for Under $1 a Pound.  There are so many great recommendations in Jeff's article such as buying produce when it is on sale, blanching it and freezing it.  Food in season tends to be cheaper (think of this when you buy green beans in January at $2.89 a pound!) and sometimes, when you buy an entire case, you can get a REALLY good deal. Every Autumn a local farmer sells his crop of sweet potatoes out of his garage. It is the only product he grows to sell and we wait every year for his sign to go up saying that his potatoes are available. He sells the exceptionally large ones or exceptionally small ones or the gnarly ones for 50 cents a pound and we buy about 85-100 pounds.  They keep all year with no special effort (we keep them in a bus tub in the bottom of the pantry) and we usually finish the last ones a month or so before they are available again.  And you can read my previous post on picking strawberries at Marburger's Orchard to see how we do pretty much the same thing with fruit.  We are picking peaches this week at Marburger's and will freeze most of them after we eat our fill of fresh ones.
Yogurt made his list at 2/$1 for the individual cups, but I think making your own is a BETTER, CHEAPER and GREENER alternative. You can go to my website, http://www.theteachingkitchen.com/ for complete instructions, plus step by step pics. I have a batch of milk heating on the stove this very minute which will be yogurt by this evening.  I mean, it's taking care of itself while I am in the office blogging.  Easy and CHEAP! 
The point of all this being that eating well-and healthy-doesn't have to be expensive. Yeah, the learning curve may be steep at first and you may have to adopt new habits, but after the initial work it becomes second nature.
Some of Jeff's recent articles on The Green Cheapskate were:
How to Compost Almost Anything    
8 Great Perennial Vegetables Almost Anyone Can Grow                             
10 Things I Learned While Living Without Running Water
Having lived for many years without running water, I especially appreciated this one!
Check out his blog for lots of great ideas on how to save money and live a better life while doing your part to help our planet.

2 comments:

Nisa said...

a cheapskate by necessity (and perhaps even genetics), i got a kick out of this one! great ideas and thanks for sharing your yogurt tips. i need to get on board with that one.

Laurel said...

Great post Diane! I really enjoy your blog!