What do you do when you find some yummy veggies and beans on sale? That’s right, you buy them, bring them home and can them. All in one day. Yeah…sometimes we’re a little crazy…
On Sunday Tool Lady found some great deals while doing our bi-weekly grocery shopping so we wound up canning:
7 pints of asparagus
8 pints of white northern beans
7 quarts of pinto beans
4 pints + 3 1/2 pints ginger glazed carrots + 1 1/2 pint carrots
5 1/2 pints sweet pickled beets + 2 1/2 pints glazed beets
We’re new at this whole “Let’s buy veggies on sale now and put ’em up so we’ll save more money in the long run.” thing and while we’ve definitely saved money so far, I’m wondering what the best course of action is so we actually continue to save money in the long run?! Do you buy in bulk and put it up? If so, do you save up mass quantities of money so you can afford items as they come available? Do you only buy what’s on super sale and what fits within your weekly/bi-weekly/monthly budget? Thanks in advance for your words of wisdom!
xoxo,
M
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Linking up to Frugal Days, Sustainable Ways #15, Homestead Barn Hop #121, HomeAcre Hop #30
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The canned asparagus looks great!!
I like to buy what’s on sale or in season and can/freeze it for future use.
Definitely helps with the budget!
Thanks for sharing your post with the HomeAcre Hop! I hope you join us this Thursday!
Great post! Just shows that you can save money and preserve produce without having a huge garden! It’s a great time of year to find deals on produce!
Thank you, Nancy! It just goes to show that you don’t have to spend a ton of money to eat well if you plan in advance and keep your eyes open for deals 🙂 Thanks for stopping by!
Yes! I have been telling my friends to do this forever! If you see a deal, buy extra and put it up for later. We grow quite a bit of produce ourselves, but purchase the rest at a local produce stand. When I first started canning, I would haggle with the owner over case prices. Now he watches for my regular visits to let me know what’s fresh and cheap, lol! Enjoy canning! Oh, and always “can with Christmas in mind.” My friends look forward to those jars in their baskets!
Not quite sure how it happened, but somehow I missed your comment! I do apologize!!!
I have learned throughout this year how much people absolutely LOVE home canned items! It’s so simple, but they love it! We will definitely be giving away home grown, home canned items this year at Christmas!
Wait. You can can all those things? I gotta learn, and soon!
YES and yes!!! The beets make the best snack!!! Who knew, right?!
Great work. When I started growing & then preserving a few years ago, I got into this mindset that I *could only* use produce from our own garden. Now I am willing to buy the stuff that didn’t grow well in our own garden, rather than miss out!
Hoping our pressure canner will arrive any day now!!
Right?! there’s no use in missing out, especially when it’s a great deal! I can’t wait to see what you do once you get your pressure canner!
We set aside a portion of our grocery budget just to do this very thing! I budget $450/month for groceries for our family of 5, but rarely spend more than $400/month. That excess is saved and when I see a great price on produce I’ll stock up. Recently our local market had 8oz. pkgs of sliced mushrooms on sale so I bought up a bunch and dehydrated the mushrooms. Those dried mushrooms are the ones I use to make homemade cream of mushroom soup.
I love your method! Thanks for sharing it! I just might have to get in the habit of stashing the leftover cash from the bi-weekly grocery budget for future purchases! And I love the idea of dehydrating mushrooms to use later in soups! Thank you!
This is awesome! Thank you so much for sharing this post on Frugal Days, Sustainable Ways. I will be posting this to the wall of my fb! What a great message:)
Thanks Andrea! And, you’re welcome 😉 I love the community you’ve introduced me to! Amazing!
I will buy in bulk once in a while,but our true goal is to produce 100% of our own food right here at home,that is by far the biggest money saver.While I don’t have a pressure canner yet,we do put up high acid foods that can be water bathed.We also freeze and dehydrate a lot of foods.
Last season was only our second growing season here,and it seems as though we spent most of the summer planting plants….we’ve put in lots of fruit trees,berry vines and bushes…all things edible.
When it came time to put food up,I got into a morning routine of canning something and then getting ready for work,as I still work a full 40 hour week.I think I canned some sort of tomato product everyday for nearly two weeks,at that point I started giving tomatoes away by the bushel.LOL…..we planted 65 tomato plants last year.
All in all our garden produced well over 400 pounds of food that we either canned,dried or froze,and it is now feeding us. :)This year we would like to try and double that number.I may have to use a vacation day from work here and there to be able to keep up with things though.
If you’re interested in seeing what we’ve got going on at our place,you can look me up at Small Town,Big Garden at blogspot.com
Wow Lee! What an inspiration you are! I long to one day grow 100% of our food! Some day we will! I’m enjoying hopping around your blog! Thanks for sharing the link! I look forward to reading more about what you’re up to!
Wow that’s awesome!
I wait until the farmer says he is running out of carrots and buy 40 lbs. then we have to figure out how to use this damned pressure canner we just bought.
40 lbs of carrots is a LOT of carrots! I’m telling you now…once you figure out your pressure canner, you’ll be addicted! It’s like MAGIC!!! We should have a canning party this summer…for real!
You’re right it is addicting! I have to tell myself I can’t can anything that day or week until my necessary work is done! Lol For me canning is fun and yes I stock up on sales as I am able
Lol…that’s a great way to control yourself! It always takes longer than I think it will to “just can up a few things”, then I’m behind on everything else! I like your method 🙂
Wow! Impressive!! Yes! I buy in bulk and can, dehydrate or freeze. I’m out of freezer space and shelf space. Considering giving up my art studio to use as a pantry since the pantry has already taken over 1/3 of that space! “Food crafting” is art too!! Right?!!! ♥
YES! Food crafting IS art, too! And it tastes SO good! 😉 Although, you should try to reserve a little space for your “regular” art, too…it feeds the soul!!!
We do the same here, we are going to try to grow 90-100% this year in garden. Compiling seed order know for baker creek.goal is 1at yr. Food canned by end of summer. Then we will start rotating canned food. Got a case of tomatoes last week on a great deal so maid a BIG pot chilling and canned 24 quarts.
WOW! 90-100%!?!? How amazing! I don’t imagine we’ll ever get that close on our little postage stamp, but we hope to have a few acres to ourselves at some point 🙂 I look forward to seeing you reach your goal!
Actually right now, we’re just buying whats on sale and letting that decide our weekly menu. We don’t have a pressure cooker so our canning options are limited. But when certain things go on sale – that rarely go on sale; like asparagus or eggplant – we do stock up and freeze.
I love freezing veggies, too! Not sure how we’ll decide what to do with what when everything’s in abundance this summer, though!
LOL you go girl 🙂 Do you guys have a pressure canner?
Yes! We got one in December as an impulse buy! It’s been so great! I can’t wait to put up veggies from our own garden!