How much food do you need to grow to be self sufficient?

This year I decided to really go big and try to grow all our own food for the year on our homestead. How's it going? And why am I replanting all my Summer crops?

Here, I'll tell you. It's going bad. And all my seedlings died, so now I have to start my seeds all over again. I blame the dramatic pepper seedlings and my indoor seed starting station. Anyways, I calculated how many plants we would need to grow to be completely self sufficient, and we are way way off. We have enough garlic... that's it. The road to self sufficiency is paved in soil blocks and hunger. You can quote me on that.

This video pairs nicely with my One Week Challenge video... where I actually prove to myself how not-self-sufficient we actually are:

Thanks for watching and supporting my fledgling homesteading channel. I'm so happy to make new friends who are interested in gardening and homesteading!

[Jerkyholic]

Uh, why do you have a HUGE mold of a persons face in your yard? And how did you not mention it in the video, I couldn’t stop looking at it... I need to know. lol.

[savageshadowwolf]

I grew a garlic, its wonderful 😂 i felt that in my soul

[myforeverhomestead]

you're hilarious! Thanks for the video ;)

[daytonvalleydeals]

This has to be the FUNNIEST video I've watched in such a long time! Thanks for making light of this but also relaying the truth as we need it! Poor eggplant and pepper!🤣

[annettevanderklippe]

So funny - so true. I love what you said about plants tenacity. That's what we need too as gardeners, keep plugging, keep trying. We need to be like our plants!

[jennyumm]

I love your little comedy bit. That was funny hehe

[ashleymcclung]

🤣 right!! 🤣. That peanuts, grapes, wheat is precisely it for my kids.

[noralacayo]

I could not stop laughing XD You are an absolute GEM! Subscribed!

[hadenwesley]

Fantastic video and as a supply chain person, yes backward math of needs, preservation, and storage are incredibly overlooked. That's before even counting for loss from pests and weather. I thought growing up around tractors, animals, gardening, etc meant I'd remember things and NOPE. The learning curve on nearly everything is so, so much steeper than I realized even as someone who grew up around some of it. I love your honesty in this--very refreshing.

[DianeS]

The level of DEDICATION for you to go that deep into your jokes is insane. Much love to you and your family. One day those kids will appreciate the taste of homegrown veggies :)

[lindaownp]

If we can live only on kale maybe we’d survive. My kale made it through the freeze in Tx without any problems.

[samira]

How is this video not viral yet? It´s so entertaining!

[JerseyBellesBudgets]

Oh my gosh 😂 I LOVE you!!! That’s totally us right now.

[skittlesskittles]

This was the greatest video about me EVER!! LoL...But I am improving. A little. 👌 💪🏻🤓

[sanctifiedbytruth]

From your kid gagging on a veggie, to your warm weather seed starting reenactment, to your garlic harvesting ...THIS IS MY FAVORITE VIDEO of yours🤣🤣🤣

I’m sharing to my Facebook page!

[HiddenBlessingsHomestead]

You are hilarious!! I had to subscribe.

[dianebeckner]

Note for Zucchini; If you want to freeze it, grate it and freeze for quick breads, to sneak into dishes. This year I'm dehydrating slices to use in place of lasagna noodles in my healthy lasagna. If you salt the slices and let them sit a bit on a towel, they'll release a lot of their juice. Then you can put them in the dehydrator. I've already tried the zukes in lasagna and it's good.

[HelenEk]

I would focus on things like potatoes, eggs and meat. A lot of vegetables are nice, but low in calories. So the main focus should be high calorie and nutrient dense foods. And then whatever else you grow can be a nice addition to that. And whatever failed crops you get, you might still be able to use it as animal feed. Chickens will eat almost anything. Rabbits can eat waste from your vegetable garden, grass, weeds, leaves..

[yatesmachine]

Dropping the bags of zucchini on the floor caused me to press the Subscribe button!

[strawberrygirl]

It's expensive, but our family decided to all pitch in and, with the help of our tax returns, buy a freeze drier (just less than $3, 000--a family going in on it together and sharing it is a good idea). We did this because we have been growing more and more food each year, canning, freezing, and dehydrating as much as we can, giving away much, too, and still there is food waste. So now we have a different plan: we are still going to can some things, probably still dehydrate our herbs and probably onions and garlic, too. But we're going to freeze dry most things (and keep our freezer free for meat, rather than trying to cram zucchini in there). We don't have a ton of room for food storage (some shelves in the garage--SOME, not many) and a closet in the house. We don't have a basement or cellar for cold storage. But we grow a ton of potatoes--so how we're going to handle potato (and other root veg) storage is to freeze dry most of them. There are great YouTube vids on different shapes and ways, like slices, diced, cooked & mashed, etc, that are very inspirational. Freeze dried foods take up much less storage, especially if you use mylar bags. But, even if you use some jars. I'm using my flower beds to grow some of my veggies this year. In amongst the flowers, which I haven't given up yet, you can plant lettuces and other greens. They look pretty and the shade of the flowers is great for them if you have hot summers. We plant cabbage, cauliflower, broccoli, and brussels sprouts in the late summer/early fall so we have a winter crop of that and keep most of our lettuces and greens going, too. They all do great in the snow and below freezing nights. This way we don't have to use garden space for these things in the summer growing season when we're growing everything else known to man. That helps with space a lot. And a winter garden grows itself without any help from humans at all. That's the kind of garden I like!