Summer is the Time for Free Food
July 23, 2008 by Jenn @ Frugal Upstate
Filed under General Frugality
I just love living in a town set in the middle of agricultural country! There is something about the sense of community and the pace of life that is just a bit more old fashioned here. I often comment to folks that I feel like I’m living in Mayberry-and it’s a feeling I enjoy.
One of the benefits of living in a small town in upstate New York is that many of the frugal things I do don’t raise an eyebrow. Plenty of neighbors have a garden, hang their laundry out to dry, and are into various DIY projects. Noone at my church so much as looked at me askew when I offered to take home the ham bones after the Easter dinner (actually, I had to share with some of the other ladies). Granted, few do all of the things I do, but the sense of Yankee sensibility and thrift are deeply ingrained enough that I don’t come off as some sort of frugal freak 
But one of the things I enjoy the most about living in this type of setting in the summer is the free food. I have got my friends and neighbors totally trained at this point-they all know that I am willing to come and get any excess garden produce that they have.
So far this year I’ve gotten cucumbers, zuchinni, dill, rhubarb, blueberries and currants. If last year is anything to go by, I’ll have even more zuchinni, plenty of tomatoes (both red and green ones at the end of the season), apples and blackberries at a minimum.
I started out small. Any time anyone that I was friends with mentioned they had an excess in the garden, I just told them I’d always be glad to take any extra produce off their hands. Most people overplant, and are happy to know it is going to someone who will use it.
To sweeten the pot, if I canned or made anything yummy (like zuchinni bread) I would make sure to share it back. Folks who gave me their excess-stuff that would probably have just spoiled on them anyway-received salsa, hot pickled green cherry tomatoes, pickles, relish and jam. That goes a long way towards their being happy to share again the next year!
So, share with us, what’s the best stuff you get for free-just for asking for it.
And if you have friends who garden, try just mentioning that you are happy to relieve them of garden extras-I’m sure you’ll have a few folks take you up on it.
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We are the same way. We receive and share.
A local farmer gives us free reign to pick in his fields after his workers have gotten what they are going to get for the season. This usually provides us with bushels upon bushels of tomatoes to can up for salsa, stewed tomatoes, spaghetti sauce, etc. He also grows pumpkins and gives us several fresh pumpkins to process into pumpkin butter and pumpkin puree for breads, pies, etc. We also watch for fallen pumpkins alongside the roads in the fall. Farmers lose them off the wagons and don’t pick them up because they are afraid they get cracked or bruised. Don’t bother me none, I’ll pick them up and process them.
Neighbors often will bring by excess produce. One year we had an abundance of cukes and zukes brought over to us. I made zucchini relish… delish in a bowl of soup beans with cornbread.
enjoy your blessings….
please share the recipe for hot pickled green cherry tomatoes…PLEASE
thanks
celina in canada
we get free stuff sometimes at the farmer’s market- the farmers are very generous with what can’t be sold. the herbs man gives me his wilting basil for free and i make it into pesto and freeze it. i also take the bruised apples that can’t be sold and make apple butter and apple sauce . oh! and the makers of fancy soap give away the chips for free, and you can melt them down and pour them into muffin pans to make your own bars. we don’t do that often, though, because it stinks up the kitchen
Celina-they are in this post (Fireballs). They taste better the longer they stay in the can before eating.
http://frugalupstate.blogspot.com/2007/09/uses-for-green-tomatoes.html
We don’t get much in the way of ‘free’ here, but there are a lot more farmers markets in the summer so I can scavenge at the end of the day for the almost free stuff. There’s a barter system online in the UK but it didn’t take off too well in NI for some reason. It woould have been so great if it had.
Farmer’s markets here travel from town to town all week so even if something is wlted and past it’s best they still think there’s a chance of selling it the next day in another town rather than give it away.
The one in Belfast is at the end of the week and the amount of rottinig fruit and veg thrown into the bins at the end of the day would make your eyes water, but still they seem to prefer to do that rather than give it away.
Amazingly even with things so expensive I’m the only one of my circle of friends or neighbours for that matter that grows my own. Strange but true.
People often say, “You’re so fortunate…everyone seems to give you stuff for free.” But I do the same thing you do: I just put it out there and advertise that I’m not above hand-me-downs and leftovers.
No one around here gardens (sigh!) because it’s too hot and dry, but we’ve been blessed by some bigger items. We got a glider for my baby’s room, a recliner and even a huge L-shaped desk and hutch with bookcases for the office (that our friends refused to take money for, so we treated their family to dinner out, like, 4-5 times!) plus tons and tons of clothes and toys for the kids.
Check out this picture of my most recent free gift. I won’t have to buy shoes for my daughter until she’s 10!!! The rows are each of the sizes we were given. Our friends are amazingly generous.
http://roosefam.blogspot.com/2008/07/im-not-above-hand-me-downs.html
Leanne-It’s always so interesting to see the cultural differences between places. Re: gardening, I think we lost a generation-the grandparents knew how to farm, but then our parents didn’t do it so much, so many of our peers have no idea of where to start.
Katie-People don’t seem to realize that you don’t get anything unless you ask for it! I remember that hte tightwad gazette said to ask, and then accept anything that’s offered, even if you just pass it on to someone else. Great score on the shoes!
WE over planted. We are giving away lettuce now. We will be giving away tomatoes too! We got a little carried away.
I agree with what you said about losing a generation ref: gardening. I think not only gardening but homekeeping and cooking too!
i get produce out of my parents garden. one of the qualifiers of a “good meal” to Mr. Right is cost. I love it when we have potatoes and corn and I can tell him that our dinner didn’t cost a dime. my father has me so spoiled he even picks it for me!
I’ve left something for you on my site today. Go there and see.
Our neighbor delivers icecream and other products to stores, and we get free icecream all the time, plus other products when they change the package and have to clean off the shelves. Or when he goes to food shows we get the leftovers. And best of all when school closes for vacation and they have to empty the milk machines it comes to my house. In return I send freash veggies over to there home.
We also live across from a fruit farmer and he allows us to pick apples.
I would definitely have to agree about losing a generation too. More people seem to try it here now because it seems fashionable. Green is the new black and all that.
My mum never gardened and looks at me as though I’m a bit mad because I do. Believe it or not I’d never had fresh peas until I was in my 20s. Whereas himself had the privilege of picking his granny’s plants clean and eating them raw when he was a wee tote. I was my daughter to remember things like that.