Update on the garden side hustle: Round 1 strawberries

I mentioned before, I'd put a few plants out on ebay and come what may. Strawberries in the bigbox retailers in my corner of Essex sell for between .50 p and 1 gbp per plant. I grouped a few together to see what would happen and listed two lots. Both lots had over 10 watchers and 10 and 7 bids. I finally ended up with a sales price that averaged around .45 p/plant, with 17 plants out the door.

One set went a few hours north by post, the other set was a local pickup in my corner of Essex. (No one else was listing strawberries within 25 miles, so I had the market cornered a bit.)

The fellow stopped by this evening to pick them up. Bla bla, they have a container garden. And the usual question for me, 'if you don't mind my asking, where are you from?' He then mentioned that his wife is from Russia, and that she is their strawberry expert.

This statement from him, with wonderment:
So I'm in the middle of downtown (my corner of Essex), buying strawberries that were grown on a roof, by an American! Who would have ever imagined that?

Who would have imagined that my strawberries were going to live with a Russian in the UK? In addition, he was mentioning that they enter some kind of garden contest and placed last year...so they're hoping that these home grown ones do the trick this year.

Super. :-) Total strawberry profit today? Around 7 gbp after reducing for paypal and ebay fees.

Today's lunch from the crockpot: shrimp in a sauce

In an effort to eat (and feel) a little better, here's what I came with today for the crockpot's inaugural meal: crockpot barbecued shrimp. It was more Southern bbq than what I know from the North as bbq, but quite good anyway. Nothing pre-packaged or processed here, and no dairy. :-)

Here are the ingredients assembled. The 'olive oil spread' that I use in place of dairy butter was feeling camera shy.

I pared the recipe down a bit, I like things saucy, but 1 stick of butter sounds exhaustive, so I went with 2 spoonfuls. I also turned up the tabasco factor (although using a close hot sauce substitute) and only decided on 1 lemon once I saw how juicy it was. I didn't have fresh basil, so dried had to do.

As the shrimp were already peeled, they went into the crockpot for an hour only, on high. I toasted two small sandwich rolls and had it with that:

Total costs:

-the shrimp were a markdown that I had tucked in the freezer a while back. 1.55 for the package, and this was half of it, so around .78 p.

-1 lemon. A package of 6 m&s lemons were 2 GBP, so this was around .33 p.

-2 rolls - another markdown from the freezer, at .50 p for 6, from m&s, so around .17 p here.

-worcester sauce - this was not previously in my cupboard, it cost around 1.29 at Tesco, but there is plenty left in the bottle for future recipes, but we can estimate .10 p here.

-butter (olive oil spread instead from m&s or sainsburys), pepper, olive oil, hot sauce, and basil are all staples already existing in my pantry, so I didn't count them in. I guess we could estimate .12 p for all together.

Total cost: around 1.50 GBP for lunch.

I will definitely do this one again, although I'll try it next time with fresh basil. It's an interesting mix, lemony, but with a bit of a kick. Perfect for a chilly and dreary Sunday.

detox week - let the games begin

During February, I've found myself getting into a bit of a rut, work has been toxic and the weather here has been grey for days upon end. Normally, I shake things up a bit with my 'alcohol-free January', but this year, most of December and January were inadvertently alcohol free due to the flu and then my law papers which were handed in on Jan 31, so I didn't have time for leisure, anyway.

I woke up this morning thinking, 'as I missed my proper January, maybe it's time for a bit of a detox.' When I don't feel well, I tend to 1. go vegan and 2. give up the alcohol. I should probably add a '3. go for more, longer walks' to that as well. Something I struggle with here in the UK is the amount of cheese in veg foods. Although, I've been attempting to introduce a bit of fish into my diet as the UK does have locally sourced fish. However, in some ways that has been a bit of my downfall...in the Philly area, we don't specialise in fish, so I'm unfamiliar to any fish variety beyond Mrs. Paul's fish sticks (on a Friday night, naturally). So in an attempt to familiarise myself with what certain varieties of fish are supposed to taste like, I've been eating a lot more 'processed' or 'prepared' foods under the heading of 'research'.

However, I fully believe, that when you set a goal and have the vision to stick to it, the universe will help you to meet it.

I stopped by my local Lakeland today, on my 'fresh air' walk. If you don't live in the UK, Lakeland is a crazy expensive kitchen boutique store, which sells top of the line merchandise. Their customer service is second to none. For my US friends, this would equate to 'the Nordstrom's of kitchen supply stores'. As expected, their pricing reflects this service level.

However, I always pop in to see their 'dent and scratch' section. They have a 'no questions asked' return policy and anything that is not perfect, even if it is only the outside carboard packaging is heavily discounted.

Lo and behold, the universe thinks that I need a juicer. It has stated that opinion by offering me one at half price:

I liked my juicer in Germany a lot. However, space was limited when I came over here, and I always wanted to expand my juicing option, to do more than just citrus fruits. This 'absolutely new in box' discontinued bargain will enable me to make juice from apples (my favourite) and carrots (plentiful and cheap here in my corner of Essex).

Something else on the shelf was a slow cooker. I've never owned one, but I've eyed them up in charity shops, but they were always too gigantic. This little gem is 1.5 litres, and half off due to a 'slight blemish on the internal ceramic pot'. When I looked at it, the manufacturing dent of sorts was there, on the outside of the ceramic pot, the bit that you do not see as it is encased inside the metal heating element. Perfect for me to try this one out, to see if I like slow cooking...

I do like lentils and soups, and there are plenty of slow cooker fish recipes, actually, using non-breaded, non-processed fish, so I'm hoping this one will be a winner.


And for dinner tonight:


Kicking things off on the right foot, a salad (the photo is deceiving, it was actually bigger than it looks). Inside we have:

• a lettuce mix from Tesco, I'm a big fan of this particular one, it has young leaves, spinach, and some fresh herbs in there. 1.50/bag, this was about 1/3 of the bag
• tomatos from M&S, marked down to 2 gbp, this was around 1/8 of the box (from Spain)
• 2/3 of a marked down avocado from M&S - .50p for the entire avocado
• 2 spring onions, from a marked down bunch in Tesco
• a sprinkling of black pepper and dried oregano
• a swig of olive oil

I'll try to post further thoughts this week, on this detox adventure...

From the rooftop garden: garlic

I try to keep garlic always outside and growing; not only do I like fresh garlic and the greens from it, Slocombe the cat loves to chop the greens down to the dirt level. She does a little better with the garlic than with regular grass digestion-wise, so further reason to encourage garlic eating by growing more of it. For the record commercial grown 'kitty-grass' seems to bore her, so garlic it is.

I have one garlic bulb left from the fall's rooftop production, I noticed that some of the cloves were starting to sprout. As the weather was warm, I went outside and filled up two recycled pots with dirt from the compost pile and placed the cloves in it, and put them on my kitchen window. After about a week, I had this:

Peeking inside the tall one, it looks like I have some stowawy seeds tucked in there from the compost pile, and they like the kitchen window temps too:

(My guess on those is that they are tomato seedlings based on the looks of them, but we'll see.)

My re-purposed plastic growing container was a 1 litre fizzy water container, check out how the roots have so quickly grown to the bottom:

On the side hustle prospects: garlic plants do sell on ebay, but not for so much. It's only worth one's while if you are propogating from 'free' stock like I am. As well, garlic is one of the easier things to grow in a garden, in general, just drop the cloves into the ground and wait.

These plants however, are all for me, as long as I can keep them on the windowsill and away from Slocombe's attention. :-)

This spring's side hustle: plants

A side hustle is a little job on the side, to make some extra cash. I mentioned a few years ago, about a little side hustle I was doing, to do something completely different than my normal job, and to make a little cash. While benevolent company J treats me very well and gives me a paycheck to boot, it's nice to try out another 'career' on the side, on the evenings and weekends.

In my fantasy world I don't have to worry about renewing a UK work permit. In my non-fantasy world, I need to keep my eye on the UK legislation, and one of the conditions of renewing my UK work permit is a certain salary level--one which computer work readily supplies. Let's save that topic for my next 'UKversary', coming up shortly. Anyway, in my fantasy world, I'd be an organic gardener, with maybe a few chickens as well.

Some months back, I mentioned the 'accidental avocados'. I did end up putting one of the avocado plants up on ebay, and then watched in wonderment as it received multiple bids, and finally sold for 5 GBP, plus shipping. I boxed it up and it went north to its' new home, near the Scottish border...

Then I started to think a little further about this idea...

• My balkon in Essex is hotter than hot. In peak weather it's above 40.
• Certain veg and plants do very well up here, others not. In particular, because I'm so far up off the ground and because of the glass walls, it's a little more of a greenhouse effect.
• Except that I have a lot more space than the average greenhouse.
• I get a jump start on the UK growing season, and mine lasts longer as well, just due to the warmer temps up here.
• The UK plant market is a bit more 'closed' than some other EU markets due to government regulations.

For kicks and giggles, I listed extra strawberry plants in the fall, the runners that wouldn't stop coming. I still have over 60 runners in little pots, here are some of them, on the left:

Then I sold a set of strawberries on ebay as well, those were carefully boxed and went to live with Ben in West Yorkshire. As they were runners, they are essentially 'free' items to me. 5 down, 60 more to go...

While I cannot orcestrate a full salad to be produced off my my space (something I could easily do by late July in Germany, on 1/10th of the space), I am able to grow and sell warm weather items, so that I can them buy my salad. ;-)

So here is part of the back balkon. Last year I lined it with tomatoes. As you can see, it's a lot of spare space.

This year, I'm thinking to go after starting off a lot seedlings to sell small plants, and then those crops that do exceptionally well up here (and not so well in Essex or the UK). I usually do half decently on getting seeds started, due to that greenhouse effect.

I'm curious to see how much pocket change I can make from something I enjoy doing on the side...

Thoughts or ideas are welcome of what I should grow to sell, or how to do it...
Plants that have done well up here:

• avocados
• chilli peppers/any hot pepper variety, although they're not a big profit maker as peppers from Thailand and Jamaica are sold cheaply here.
• thai basil, from seed
• cat nip (cat mint) - last year's plants are already getting new growth for this season. I started with two small seedlings from the nursery and they mushroomed into 18 inches with pretty purple flowers on top. They over-wintered on the balkon and are now coming back with a vengence

Those who have failed up here, to various degrees:

• The cauliflowers - I attracted the white butterflies that created worms that demolished them.
• Lettuce - it gets too hot up here, so it goes quickly to seed
• Eggplant - couldn't get the seeds to sprout

Indifferent

• Potatoes - they do ok, but my winter ones flopped with our early freeze
• Tomatoes - they like the heat, but my plants get too hot and then get wilty. I actually had better tomatoes in Germany, by far

More frugal eating: zucchini boats

In a quest to use the cheap zucchini, it ended up a a side one evening, in a thrown together recipe of zucchini boats:

Nothing fancy again...the sliced in half zucchinis went into the oven for a little, with a little olive oil on them. While that was happening, just a little chopped onion and garlic in a pot with some olive oil, and in when all the veg I had on hand: a few sliced mushrooms, some tomatoes, and a carrot. The boats then came out of the oven and were hollowed out.

Next, the filling that was hollowed out was added to the pot, along with some sage. That was then scooped into the boats, along with a little cheddar. It went back into the oven for around 7 min. At that point, some breadcrumbs were sprinkled on top, and back in the oven for another 5 min, enough to brown them.

Total meal cost:

.15 p each for 2 zucchini

I had already incorporated the other veg and cheese costs into the main meals where they were used, so let's add it all up to .10 p per zucchini, so a total cost of .25 p for this side serving pictured.

New friend Ian deemed this one a success and asked for a repeat performance.

Frugal eating: Zucchini

Here in the UK I'd love to be able to grow Zucchini (or courgettes for the British trained amongst us)...however, my balkon here is way to warm. While in Germany I had no problem to spit them out in containers, in the UK I fizzled once they got to flowers and about two inches. It was just too warm, and they'd rot. (grumble, grumble)

However, I made the 'Markdown Madness' rounds last night. Often, I'll step out for some fresh air and will make a habit to allow Tesco and M&S prices to dictate my menus, making my rounds around when the good markdowns should have just taken place.

Normal price at Tesco for 2 courgettes is 1.20 GBP (1.42 EUR/1.61 USD). Yikes, yikes, yikes!! That's for zucchini about 4-5 inches, and NOT organic!

I realize that is sorta expensive for the US and EU costs, and I've yet to bring myself to pay this. However, let's see ('Schau mal' for my German friends), what I found:

Going to my local tesco around 18.30 results in finding things 75% off. So I picked up 4 packages of them. :-) At .3o p for 2, that's .15 p (.18 EUR/.24 USD) each, or 75% off. I could have purchased 3 more, but the expiry was on Thursday. After giving them a short tap, I estimated they'd be fine until Sunday, so thus I purchased 4 total.

The first offerings...nothing fancy...a little olive oil and onion, and then I added two sliced zucchini, and at the end sprinkled them with black pepper. Here is 1/2 of that. So I had one half on the first night, and then leftovers on the second night.

-->Don't you wish that you lived near my corner of Essex? We have 3 more packages to go through! ;-)

Tomorrow, they'll be making an appearance in fajitas, when New friend Ian will be here.