Payment for eggs? Or homegrown veg / homemade crafts?

Posted by louisa on Tuesday 21 June 2011 in chickens, growing | 12 comments

Last week when John’s mum was visiting, she mentioned that she had been wondering about paying us for the eggs we give the family. I think we gave her/John’s dad effectively three half-dozens last week – which would cost about £5 in the shops, but cost us just under £2*. She tried to give us some money but John refused to accept it on principle, and bundled her out of the door before she could argue — it did lead us to talk about it afterwards though.

When we got the extra girls last year and it made it easier for us to regularly give away boxes of eggs, John & I talked about taking a nominal charge for them to pay for the extra feed and that sort of thing – but never actually got around to doing it. With the six girls now, we are really just giving away our spares; I think if we had enough chickens to warrant doing a “garden gate” stand to sell them (or sold them at our workplaces), we’d be more inclined to take money from friends but for us right now, while we’re ok for money and it’s just a casual thing, it feels a bit petty to ask good friends and family for £1 here and there.

Even if we were selling them though, John said he wouldn’t accept any money from his mum and dad because they’ve given, and continue to give, us so much – over the last fortnight, John’s dad has put up a fence for us, supplying all the wood (some free; some paid for) as well as labour — that is surely worth a few eggs!

Expanding from that, we realised that at least half of the people we regularly give eggs to frequently give us they’ve made/do something for us in return – and we like that idea of unofficial/unspoken bartering because it stops it being just about money and becomes about time/effort instead. There are a few people to whom we regularly give eggs that don’t really give us anything in return – and we’re not bothered about that (if we cared, we wouldn’t give them eggs so often!), but if they ask to give money towards feed now, we’re more likely to say “bake us a cake sometime instead”.

Something related: last year or so, I realised that I’m always more inclined to give produce or crafty things to other growers & crafters etc. Perhaps I wouldn’t be so bothered if I had a mega glut of things – but at the moment while my output is more limited, if I have to choice between giving stuff to a grower/maker or a non-grower, I’d almost always lean towards the grower. They realise that homegrown/homemade things aren’t necessarily always aesthetically perfect and they know the effort that goes into producing the finished fruit or project.

Someone who doesn’t grow their own veg may see as courgette as something worth (say) 60p, which may be a few minutes of their working time, the same price as a Mars bar or can of Coke, but a grower (or someone who has grown in the past) sees the ongoing care and attention that went into growing it, and that’s far more valuable. (I think that’s why people who grow/cook/make etc are generally less wasteful too – it’s easier for them to see/imagine the effort.)

What do you think? Do you sell your surplus at a “garden gate” or to friends and family? Or do you give everything away for free? How does it work for you?

* our per egg cost is usually around 9p, so £1.62, but has been a little more lately because of expenses to do with the red mite infestation last month; I’m putting it at around 11p or 12p an egg at the moment.

The weekend of exploding cider bottles

Posted by louisa on Monday 20 June 2011 in homebrewing | 7 comments

It actually started on Thursday night/Friday morning. I woke up to find Lily-dog shut out of the kitchen and John inside the kitchen looking confused. There were bits of glass on the floor but not enough to be a whole bottle or glass – but he couldn’t find the rest of whatever had broken. He was inspecting the empty beer bottles from Wednesday night’s beery evening when Detective Louisa stepped up and suggested the cider – which was housed at the other end of the kitchen, about 4m away – may be to blame. Lo and beyond, the rest of the shattered bottled was found.

John cleared up and put a towel over the remaining bottles – just in case any others decided to go bang. And go bang they did – yesterday morning while I was relaxing (well, gaming) on the sofa in the next room. I have no idea how we missed the first one – the second boom was LOUD. It turned out three bottles had broken – presumably one had set the other too off, and they had also shattered the glass of the kitchen clock (which was above the bottles) and left deep scars in its plastic. Thankfully the towel had caught most of the glass – but sticky cider dripped everywhere.

While he was cleaning up that lot, he put the remaining five bottles into a strong plastic bucket, with a piece of wood on the top, weighed down with a 2kg weight. Just after he’d finished cleaning up, one of those bottles exploded too – the force of the explosion didn’t break the other bottles but it was enough to lift the wood & weight to spray small bits of glass in the vicinity of the bucket. John immediately decanted the cider from the remaining bottles into strong plastic bottles and vowed that it would be drunk by his family that afternoon (it was).

We think a few things might have caused the explosions:

1. a little too much sugar added at the last stage
2. not enough air space left in each bottle
3. the bottles weren’t a strong as they appeared – he’d reused old shop-bought cider/beer bottles as instructed by experts/other homebrewers but perhaps they weren’t as strong as they should be. It was the bottles that gave way, not the caps popping off.

Whatever happened though, it was frickin’ scary and definitely something we don’t want to repeat. I can only imagine the damage it would have done to us or the animals if we’d been in the kitchen at the time.

Have you had homebrew explode before? What precautions do take to avoid it?

This week’s meal plan

Posted by louisa on Monday 20 June 2011 in weekly meal plans | 0 comments

Last week’s mostly-eating-from-the-freezer week was good – the closest we’ve stuck to the meal plan for a long time (aside from the beef goulash and “for next week”‘s sausage & lentil casserole swapped places).

This week should see the first not-just-salad crops from the garden – broad beans and new potatoes will definitely feature, and we might get our first courgette too. I heart this time of year :)

Sunday brunch – bacon butties (yay!)
Sunday dinner – roast beef dinner (John went to his mum & dad’s for lunch and brought a plate back for me)

Monday lunch – tomato soup with a pastrami & pickle sandwich
Monday dinner – pasta with tuna, sweetcorn, olives and chillis

Tuesday lunch – leftover pasta with tuna etc
Tuesday dinner – some sort of risotto (whatever John fancies making)

Wednesday lunch – poached eggs (hopefully! going to learn how to make them)
Wednesday dinner – the beef goulash I forgot to make in time last week

Thursday lunch – samosas, salad & pickles
Thursday dinner – leftover goulash

Friday lunch – bread, cheese & pickles
Friday dinner – new potato & broad bean salad (both from the garden, woo), with bacon/pancetta & poached egg (hopefully!)

Ten things about me

Posted by louisa on Friday 17 June 2011 in meta | 1 comment

Woohoo! Jo from The Good Life has given me the Kreativ Blogger Award – which she received from Bluebell at At Home in the Country.

Apparently I’m supposed to tell you ten things about myself – it means this blog is a bit long and self-indulgent though so feel free to skip ;)

In case everyone does want to skip the following waffle, I’ll pass the award on now – I’ll pass it onto Rachel from Growing Things and Making Things, Alexis from the Hour of Scampering, and over in the US, Kate from Living the Frugal Life (who I need to email – sorry for the delay Kate!).

Ten Things About Me

1. I don’t like any fruit
At all. At least not in its raw state, as juice or as a pudding when it’s still identifiable as fruit. I think I had a bad experience with a horrible fruity pudding when I was four and now anything fruity makes me gip (I like the smell of some fruit but can’t stand the taste of it). It’s an annoying trait because it does limit what I can consume from growing my own/foraging – I grow/forage fruit for (my boyfriend) John to eat or to turn into jam/fruity chutneys (which I do like).

Do you use supermarket “loyalty” cards?

Posted by louisa on Thursday 16 June 2011 in admin, frugal | 13 comments

Well, do you?

I’m asking because I don’t really – I have one card (a Co-op card) but that’s it – and I’m wondering if that’s really errant frugal behaviour.

The supermarket we use the most (Morrisons) doesn’t have a loyalty card scheme but our current number two supermarket (Sainsburys, the nearest shop to us so used for bread & milk etc) heavily promote theirs, and every time they do, we say no. I think we’d say no if Morrisons had one too – we don’t like the idea of giving supermarkets (or other big corporations) data to allow them to market stuff to us more effectively.

But at the same time, I know people who use collected points in a canny, frugal way – turning £10 worth of point into £20 worth of vouchers for somewhere they’d already go/something they’d buy. Most people I know who do have cards have them for everywhere so there is no great “loyalty” to any one shop in particular, just the money-off vouchers/gift vouchers as a bonus.

What do you think?