We just had our first tomato sale this weekend. We sold about 15 lbs of tomatoes, making $45 in 4 hours. It may not seem like much, but if you consider our rural location you would agree that it’s pretty awesome. Aidan was a huge help and loved weighing them, making change and asking each person what their name was. He’s been looking forward to this years ‘Tomato Stand’ for many weeks. It’s obvious that not only are we teaching him amazing skills in how to cultivate his own sustainable food, but mathematics, science, and communication as well. Some customers used english as a second language, and we tried to give him as much of an opportunity as we could to practice his spanish as well. Good stuff!
Everthing that is left over from this batch will go to a local CSA
The tomatoes are really tasty, too. Combined with the jalapenos that I grew I made some amazing salsa and plan on making more.
So far the garden has cost us about $400 in materials and water (mostly water). We have consumed at least 400 lbs of produce between my family and our friends Michael and Lisa, who also have two young boys. If I just break even this year I’ll be very happy, especially when I think that so much healthy food was eaten by us straight out of our organic garden rather than purchased at a grocery store.
Although we grew many other things, the tomatoes were really the only ‘cash crop’ we grew. Everything else was just for our own consumption.
Another first for us was growing dried beans – a fantastic source of protein, bean soups are one of my favorites to make for the family. We have a fantastic buckeye bean that I have yet to cook, but I will post that experience and a recipe when I do.
Tags: buy local, CSA, organic growing, tomato
