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Tuesday 19 June 2012

Quick and Easy Cheap and Healthy How to Become a Gardener {7 Days, 7 Tools: Build a Better Grocery Budget}

Quick and Easy Cheap and Healthy How to Become a Gardener {7 Days, 7 Tools: Build a Better Grocery Budget}

Link to Quick and Easy Cheap and Healthy

How to Become a Gardener {7 Days, 7 Tools: Build a Better Grocery Budget}

Posted: 18 Jun 2012 07:08 PM PDT


In 6 days, my new eBook, Your Grocery Budget Toolbox, is scheduled to be released! All this week, I will be giving you sneak peeks of what you will find in the book, and whet your appetite for more. Because trust me, there’s a lot more. Your Grocery Budget Toolbox is over 150 pages long, each page loaded with all the tools you need to build a better grocery budget. Join with me this week (subscribe so you don’t miss a single post), and share with your friends (use the buttons to the left)… I have a feeling they’d appreciate a little grocery budget makeover, too.

In Chapter 8: Take it to the Next Level, I bring you all sorts of strategies about how to take your frugality to another level, one that goes beyond the bottom line of how much you fork over at the grocery store. Because that total at the bottom of your receipt only tells you part of the story. True frugality is a lifestyle, and involves active participation on your part.

We all know, of course, that fruits and vegetables should make up the largest part of our diet. But that can get confusing… and costly. These thoughts probably run through your head:

  • Should you buy organic? 
  • Or is it more important to buy local? 
  • Is organic worth the price?
  • Do you even have enough money in my budget to buy organic or local produce? 
  • You understand that you should eat more fruits and vegetables, but if you bought as much as “they” say you should, you’d end up spending your entire grocery budget! Especially if you only bought organic and/or local!

These problems (which, by the way, I specifically address in the book!) can all be solved by growing your own fruits and vegetables yourself. Oh, I know, I know. That brings up a whole other host of questions and concerns, like:

  • Uh…. I don’t know the first thing about gardening!
  • And um, yeah. I live in the city. No yard!
  • Apples? I can grow apples? 
  • I’ve tried gardening before. I stink at it. 

Once again, I address most of these concerns in the book. But the truth? I am not a gardener. Not even close! However, I keep trying. Remember the old adage that says, “If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again.” There’s a lot of truth to that pithy old saying, so I keep chugging along. Every year, I start a garden, and every year, I eventually fail. But I’ve had some success along the way (check out my flourishing garden last year before the whole concept of watering began to slip my mind), and I’ve learned a lot from my failures.

my little future blogger, who grabs my old camera and starts taking pictures right beside me

Arm Yourself with Resources

One big mistake I have made (repeatedly, actually) in my gardening career was just winging it. There are a lot of things in life wherein one can successfully “wing it” – trust me, I do it all the time – but for me, gardening is definitely not one of them. My thumb is as black as the night, and despite my mom’s best efforts, gardening does not come naturally to me! So I have started following gardening blogs, checking gardening books out of the library, and looking up gardening websites. Pinterest has proven a valuable resource as other people pin gardening tips that you won’t necessarily find in a book. I’ve collected quite a few of them on myGarden Help Pinboard. I include a ton of links to great gardening resources in the book, but right now I’ll give you my favorite: Urban Organic Gardener, a blog by Mike Lieberman that’s all about how to garden in small spaces. Even if you have a spacious yard, you’ll find helpful information and resources on  his blog, so I highly recommend following it! I made his self-watering plant containers, and I love them! Super awesome invention for a forgetful gardener like myself. Ahem.

Start Small

I have also often been guilty of attempting too much. You should see my massive collection of empty plant containers. On second thought, you shouldn’t, because it’s not very pretty: It’s like a plant graveyard. I’ve learned to curb my enthusiasm and go slowly. If you’ve never gardened before, it’s highly unlikely that you’ll harvest a farm’s worth of produce in  your first year. It’s best not to try, because you’ll only get discouraged.

Instead, start small. Choose your favorite vegetable (you could go with a fruit, but most of them are harder to grow than veggies), find out if it grows well in your area, read up on it, and then plant it. If you have a yard, go ahead and fill a whole plot with that one vegetable. If you only have a balcony, just start with one pot (and make sure your plant will grow successfully in a pot!). Once you’ve mastered that vegetable (What a sense of accomplishment!), then you can proceed to others.

Start Simple

I don’t recommend starting with seeds. It’s cheaper, for sure, and easier to ensure organic and non-GMO produce, but it’s a lot harder. If you’re just starting out in the gardening world, definitely – definitely! – go for the seedlings you can find at the farmers’ market or local nursery. Bonus: You can ask the farmers or nursery workers to help you find a plant that’s perfectly suited for you (your gardening level, space accommodations, level of sunlight, type of soil, etc.) instead of blindly picking up packages of seeds that may or may not grow well in your situation.

Also, I really recommend starting with easier plants. A tomato plant is a great place to start, or perhaps zucchini. Herbs are fairly easy to grow as well (although I’ve found that a little strategic pruning is very useful with certain herbs like basil).

Water, Water, Water

This is my biggest downfall every year, and this is how I always kill my plants: I forget to water them! This is especially important if your garden is all in containers – you must water your plants daily or they will not flourish. And if you forget for even a couple days, the hot summer weather will kill them for sure. If you’re going away for more than a few days, find friends who would be willing to water them for you. Plants require water to survive. It’s so basic, but it’s so easy to forget. (Of course, that could just be me.)

Don’t Sweat It

There’s absolutely no need to stress out about the success or failure of your garden. Unless it’s your livelihood (which I highly doubt it is if you are still reading this!), a dead plant or two is  not going to spell the end for you. Learn everything you can from your mistake (Not enough watering? Too much watering? Not enough sun? A pest or disease?) and try again. Whether you harvest 1 little cherry tomato or a bushel of zucchini, just keep going. The longer you garden, the more you’ll learn, and the more successful you will be.

And just to prove it to you, I’m going to show you my garden, which is doing quite well, considering it’s already the middle of June! Of course, we haven’t had super hot weather here yet, which always seems to do me in. But I’m quite pleased so far with the progress: I’ve even harvested a jalapeno pepper! (I put it in this Black Bean Chili with Avocado Mousse.)

Quick and Easy Cheap and Healthy: How to Become a GardenerClockwise from the top left:

  • One of my two tomato plants, with 1 growing tomato on it, and 2 little baby tomatoes!
  • Spearmint, which is kind of gangly, but growing.
  • Cucumbers, flourishing but not quite at the fruitful stage yet.
  • Basil and Sage, both of which have been pruned since I took this picture last week. They’re looking fuller already!
  • Stevia – it’s supposed to get to 2 ft or more, and it’s well on its way!
  • Jalapeno peppers – already harvested one, and a couple little baby ones in the works.

I am struggling with my second tomato plant. It looks great:

… but it’s not producing any fruit, and when you look closely, you can see this:

If you can tell me what causes that and how to fix it, I’ll love you forever!!

See? Gardening, like anything in life, is a mixture of success and failure. Keep at it, and the success prove to be worth every failure!

So… get out there and grow a garden! 

What keeps you from gardening? And if you’re an expert, any advice to share with us beginners?

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Black Bean Chili with Avocado Mousse {Recipes from Avocado Lovers}

Posted: 18 Jun 2012 04:13 PM PDT

Quick and Easy Cheap and Healthy: Black Bean Chili with Avocado MousseWe are avocado lovers around here. Well, my boys and I are. My DH doesn’t much care for them (although he enjoys my Chicken Pizza with Avocado Ranch Sauce well enough). But ever since my boys were babies, they’ve been eating avocado straight up like it’s candy. Delicious, wholesome, healthy candy.

I’ve experimented with avocado in baking – still working on that one – and in smoothies (Shamrock Shake, and Choc-Ocado Smoothie), as a pasta sauce, and – naturally – in guacamole. Recently, though, Avocados from Mexico challenged some of us bloggers to create new Mexican-inspired recipes using avocados. My mind naturally goes to guacamole when I think of Mexican avocado dishes, but I wanted to do something a little different. As yummy as guacamole is, and as fun as it is to create different variations of it, I embraced the opportunity to come up with something I’ve never done before.


Avocado Mousse is what I ended up with, although not the typical dessert variety (I’ve had the chocolate one – it’s yummy!). Nope! I went with a savory version, and served it atop some black bean chili. Yum! Black beans and avocado were made for each other, don’t you think?

If you’re an avocado lover, too, you can find a whole treasure trove of avocado inspiration at Recipes from Avocado Lovers. There’s a whole section there devoted to guacamole if that’s your preferred method of avocado delivery, but if you’re a little more adventuresome, you’ll find ideas for Avocado Ice Cream, Baked Eggvocado, Mexican Lasagna, and a whole lot more. You can also upload your own favorite avocado recipes so others can enjoy them, too.

Quick and Easy Cheap and Healthy: Black Bean Chili with Avocado Mousse

Black Bean Chili with Avocado Mousse

Ingredients

Chili:

  • 1 lb black beans (rinsed, soaked, and drained)
  • 5 cups broth (chicken or vegetable)
  • 4-5 cloves garlic, minced
  • 1/2 cup chopped onion
  • 1 cup corn
  • 1-2 jalapeno peppers
  • 1 small sweet red pepper
  • 1 TBSP cumin
  • 1 tsp paprika
  • 1 tsp chili powder
  • 2-3 bay leaves
  • 1-2 tsp salt

Avocado Mousse:

  • 2 small avocados
  • 1 TBSP lemon juice
  • 1 TBSP fresh cilantro (or a few sprigs)
  • dash salt
  • 1/4 cup plain yogurt or sour cream

Instructions

Chili:

  1. Place the beans and broth in a slow cooker and cook on high for 2-4 hours or until beans are softened.
  2. Add garlic, onions, corn, peppers and spices, and cook for an additional hour or two. Serve topped with avocado mousse.

Avocado Mousse:

  1. Pulse the avocados, lemon juice, cilantro and salt in a food processor or blender (I used my VitaMix on speed 3-4) until smooth and thick. Remove from blender and fold in yogurt or sour cream. Pipe or spoon onto chili before serving.


It’s not exactly QUICK because you have to soak the beans and everything. But the hands on time is minimal. And the avocado mousse is a special touch that takes less than a few minutes.

The slow cooker makes it EASY! So does the VitaMix.

Beans are CHEAP, so they make a great frugal meal anytime! And I found Organic Avocados from Mexico at Trader Joe’s in a package of 4 for less than $4, so they were pretty cheap, too.

Wow, this dish is so HEALTHY! The healthy fats from the avocado and yogurt, combined with the protein and fiber from the beans make it a delicious combination that is really good for you.

Submit a recipe to the Recipes From Avocado Lovers website from Avocados From Mexico

Are you an avocado lover?

 

 This post contains affiliate links.
This sponsorship is brought to you by Avocados From Mexico who we have partnered with for this promotion.

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at 04:05

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