Speaking of fighting inflation by seeking economic alternatives, more of my friends back in Madison are using the community garden to reduce the impact of grocery inflation:
Located on S.W. 4th Street, the Madison Community Garden offers the opportunity for residents to grow their own food.
The garden offers 40 plots, each at the size of 20 feet by 25 feet. The rental price is $40 a year. The costs cover not only the plot but also water. This year, all of the plots are filled.
…The Allens both eat and give away the food they grow. They also have made salsa and spaghetti sauce and canned tomatoes.
“With prices nowadays, it helps save on the grocery bill,” Lori said [Katelyn Winberg, “Community Garden Offers Alternative to Rising Grocery Bills,” Madison Daily Leader, 2022.06.21].
Like biking instead of driving, gardening instead of grocery shopping requires a little sweat, and it’s not for everybody come winter. But every alternative helps.
Yup. In the Wisconsin Madison, as well. Liz and I have been working our garden plot again this year. We got off to a later than usual start because of late spring cold. We ain’t spring chickens anymore, so it takes us longer to do stuff, but we got the plot planted. We’ve harvested asparagus and lettuce, and the lettuce will keep going for awhile. Our spinach plot fizzled this year. Snow peas are flowering, so we’ll be harvesting soon. We have green beans (bush and pole varieties) doing well. I planted too much zucchini again this year, so we’ll have some to give away. Also tomatoes, butternut, butter cup and delicotta squash. Several varieties of peppers, oregano, basil, thyme, sage. We eat well during growing season, and freeze some produce for use through part of the winter.
Well done, MadTown 👍🏻
We do that in Nokomis too.
They should repeal the $40 fee for the plot of dirt. Anybody opposed to that needs to vote against the repeal of the tax on food. And just go to the grocery and buy a plump tomato and a big bag of store bought taters to fry up for breakfast. Cavemen almost went extinct because they didn’t farm in large enough batches of food. Conglomerates, the surviving cavemen discovered, are the way to go. Giant farming operations work best.
Come on gruds your proof that cavemen are far from extinct.
Our family had a community garden plot in Rapid. The garden was sited on vacated post-1972 flood land near Rapid Creek – very fertile and plenty of irrigation when needed. The folks grew tomatoes, beans, lettuce, cukes, radishes and carrots … I became a vegetable fan after finally learning what they were really supposed to taste like.
Gardening is great pastime and home gerown vegvgvies are better than most store bought cardboard tomatoes, etc. Onions are buklbing and need more water. our kinds of spuds are growing nicely. Not sure peppers will amount to much. They have not escaped confines of cement tiles and it is late for them to do that.
Got much needed rain overnight. Got some home made salsa in exchange for a bunch of asparagus and I am dying to try this new salsa on baked tater. Yum Yum.