Saturday, June 9, 2012

Get to Know Your Farmers

This year, I am growing some tomatoes, but definitely not enough to meet all of the tomato needs for our family.  We have 4 Roma, 2 Black Krim, 1 Cherokee Purple, 1 Stripy and one Cherry Tomato.  So far with the Roma, we are washing and coring them and putting them in the freezer for later canning.  The rest, we are just eating - yum!! 


Knowing that we won't have enough tomatoes for all our canning, I've been putting out feelers to all the farmers at our market, looking for canning tomatoes.  Canning tomatoes, or canners, are seconds, or less than perfect tomatoes (strange shaped, bruised, blemished, etc).  In addition to coring these, I just cut off the  less than perfect parts and have tomatoes perfect for canning.  One farmer in particular has been receptive to an arrangement, and so I've been getting tomatoes and peppers for salsa at a fraction of their regular price.  In exchange, I've been selling some of my items to her at an extremely reduced rate, and giving her the bread
we have left at the end of the day for free.  We are helping each other out, and both benefitting from our arrangement.  If you have a relationship with a farmer, ask them about their seconds to see if they need a way to make some money off of them.  You might be able to make sauces and salsas for less.

No comments: