Sourcing Food Beyond The Grocery Store

Recent news stories may be causing anxiety relating to climbing food prices and availability. You have more options than just the grocery store to source food and begin creating food independence and security.

Gardening

Plant a garden. Even a single plant, especially a tomato, zucchini, or squash plant, can give you a decent amount of food as it produces for quite a while during the warm summer months. You can start in a container on a balcony, deck, porch, or the side of a garage. Work with whatever space you have. If you have more room, plant more, but stay small enough that it doesn’t feel overwhelming. 

What are your favorites?  Start with those or something that grows fast or is easy to care for. Leaf lettuce varieties, radishes, beets, peas, zucchini, summer squash, green beans, and tomatoes are suitable options for beginning gardeners.

Using a trellis will help you save some ground space and let climbing plants grow up instead of out, allowing you to plant more in the same space while adding visual appeal to your garden. It can also create lovely shade for you or other plants that don’t like full sun. 

If you have a garden, you might want chickens, too. They can benefit each other. Chicken manure is a great fertilizer. Composted bedding with manure can be used as a mulch or soil amendment, and chickens near your garden can help keep the bug population down. If the chickens are layers, they will provide you with eggs, or if you want chickens for a short time, consider meat birds and fill your freezer in a season or less. Sharing extra garden produce with chickens can help keep feed costs low and provide you with quality, nutritious, and fresh eggs if you’re raising layer breeds. 

Farmer’s Markets

If you aren’t ready for a garden but want fresh food, search for farmer’s markets near you. You can select what you want and which vendor or vendors to support. Getting to know a local farmer can be helpful because you can ask about the methods used to raise the food. What is important to you? Non-GMO, organic, regenerative? Talking to the farmer will yield a lot of information and sometimes have you walking away with more to think about. In addition to produce, farmer’s markets may also provide you with options for meat, eggs, dairy, or honey. 

Community Supported Agriculture

Community Supported Agriculture, or CSA, is another option that may be available to you. Many CSAs offer seasonal subscriptions for produce, meat, or dairy items. This allows you to get to know your farmer each time you pick up throughout the season.

Here are some sites to help you find the resources discussed:

• Local Hens. This site can help you to find local sources of eggs, meat, and produce, and connect you to local farms, restaurants, outdoor markets, CSAs, and even grocery stores where you can find fresh, local foods.  Select the categories you would like to purchase and search using your zip code.  
• USDA Local Food Directories allows searches by location and the following categories: agritourism, CSA, farmers markets, food hubs, or on-farm markets. 
• Meyer Hatchery’s Hatchery to Farm page, where we are pleased to feature farms feeding their local communities with poultry sourced from Meyer Hatchery. These farms are vital to communities as each works hard to provide the highest quality eggs and meat.
• Local Harvest. This site is similar to the USDA Local Food Directories because it allows you to search by category and location, but the category list includes the following: CSAs, farms, farmers’ markets, and events.  

Hopefully, this information will both inspire and help you to source foods as locally as your own garden or community.