A week's haul from the Farmer's Market, costing only around £7 much of which lasted more than one week.
Like Bev, I visited the Sunday farmer’s market for some produce, getting a week’s worth of potatoes, apples, carrots, onions, garlic and broccoli for just £6.60. Last week we made making fried potatoes (hashbrowns), applesauce and a nut roast I got from Arjuna last week (which costs around £2.50 and feeds us both quite well). I made enough potatoes for lunch the next day, and the applesauce too made it to dinner the following night as well.
Making your own applesauce is extremely easy, tasty and cheap as we discovered this past fall when looking for a use for apples that had acquired a bruise or two during our gravity-assisted picking of apples from the neighbour’s tree. It’s a great way to add some fruit to dinner, even in winter when you might be getting mighty tired of root vegetables! Apples will stay good all winter if stored properly, usually in a cool spot in the house.
Dinner is served!
To make your own applesauce, just skin and core the apples – we used about 6 regular sized apples for this batch and it fed us for two meals – chop them into pieces and pop them in a pot of water that just barely covers them. You can always add more water, but if you’ve got too much you need to wait for it to boil off before you can eat the applesauce, so err on the side of less. Let the water boil, and then simmer on med-high until the apples are good and mushy (about 20 to 30 mins), depending on your apples and the level of heat you’re using. You’ll be able to stir the pot and they just fall apart. Mush up the apples, and if there’s no excess water, it’s ready. We add a touch of nutmeg and cinnamon and we never find the need for any extra sugar, so taste it before you add anything else. Yum!
Making your own stuff from scratch is one of the important tricks to eating both sustainably and cheaply, because there’s a high amount of carbon and waste involved with the processing of foods, and because you can buy the raw ingredients, like apples, with minimal packaging for cheaper than the processed good. Plus it always tastes better, fresher and with no preservatives. As long as you’re willing to put in a very tiny amount of extra effort, the advantages are definitely on the side of the home-made, from scratch options!
Posted by Stephanie