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Alternative take, but I get a lot of value from gardening as complimentary to supermarkets.

I normally grow potatoes, carots etc, and have an apple tree, and several herbs like dill, mint, thyme etc that pretty much manage themselves. It's very far from meaning I never need to shop again, and like you pointed out, to get to that point you'd pretty much need to quit your job and work full time growing food.

That said, it does add a bit of resillience into the system (as well as being rewarding) in the same way having solar panels might shield you from energy cost fluctuations without totally removing your dependence on the grid. I save a lot of money on fresh herbs, and never need to buy apples during season.

It's nice physical activity, satisfying, healthy, makes me happy to go out, Also not everything is priced the same. If i wanted to cut back i'd still grow some stuff that's easy to grow but for some reason expensive here. I get to give some stuff away that's hard to preserve. And when winter comes....yeah i go to the store more often because i totally could but don't like eating only frozen, canned, pumpkins, beets, carrots, & leftover kale/winter spinach, etc Is there a problem with that?

>Statistics also show that people in the cities eat much more vegetables than people in the country side - if you exclude potatoes. I don’t want to eat potatoes only.

I'm very confused how that has to do with anything?

>But if I have to prevent any DDoS that is already too much to handle and I am DevOps by trade and we buy anti DDoS services.

I'd have some serious questions if someone were to feel the need to ddos my blog. But I think some ddos protection comes with my ovh plan. I could be running on some rpi in a closet but i don't in the same way that i could be seedsaving but don't.

> I'm very confused how that has to do with anything?

Presumably people in the country are more easily able to grow vegetables. If they aren't doing it, then it implies that growing vegetables isn't worth the time.

I think there are other confounding factors like income and education.

I would say one confounding factor is city people can get by on a salad an quinoa. If you live and work in country side beans, potatoes, meat are must have in a diet.

> Amounts are too much to consume at once and not enough to consume for longer periods.

Sounds interesting. Some techniques one can use to mitigate that:

- spread plantations overtime

- use early/normal/late variety

Other techniques ideas than jar:

- sun dry (fruits): boost vitD at the same time

- dark and fresh basement (potatoes, squashes…)

- fermentation (fruits, leaves, roots, ANYTHING!) there’s a bunch of man-old techniques to conserve your vegetable. They’ll keep many nutrients and add some probiotics. Kimchy, pickles (super easy)…

Growing food is secondary to storing food. If you just grow your own food without thinking about preservation, it's very easy to run into the situation you mention. Where you have a larger harvest of something than you are able to use at once, and no method of keeping it from spoiling.

Conversely, if you know how to pickle and can, and have a chest freezer and maybe a food processor, it's very easy to buy bulk amounts of vegetables when they are in season and store for later. You get basically the same benefits as with growing your own, for much less effort, and quite possibly less expense.

Alternatively, something that doesn't seem to be mentioned so far in this comment threads, is befriending your neighbors and gifting them what vegetables/fruits they don't have and them doing the same to you, hopefully leading to less stock of everything but more variety.

One potential problem I see is that if your neighbors are into gardening, they're likely to have had the same type of things do well that particular season. So sure, if your neighbor has some apple variety you don't, you can swap. Or your broccoli for their cauliflower or other Brassica. But it might not mean that much for variety in the end.

But giving food away and getting nothing in return is preferable to having it spoil, obviously. And every situation is different.

This might be climate dependent.

Here in the subtropics, I've found it relatively easy to get the majority of our fruits and veggies from our backyard, with things like papayas and panama berries producing year round. In temperate climates you'll have more difficulty though.

I think there are many upsides of maintaining a garden: you learn how to grow different crops (that you wouldn’t if you didn’t grow a garden) and how to combat disease, you get fresh air, vitamin d and an occasion to wind down, you get to eat your own veggies which taste far better than store bought for the simple fact that you grew them yourself. Maybe it doesn’t make you self sustainable in case of war, but it sure gives you the basics over someone who has never grown anything…

Definitely, especially since in the case of war e.t.c., rationing is likely to be in effect. You'll get enough to live, but you'll probably be wanting for a little extra.

Since you tried it, you now have now developed some skills to be able to raise some vegetables if you're in a real pickle (ha!).

Maybe that is the most valuable thing from such a garden: not being totally helpless if the need does arise for some reason.

And when that does, there are probably more people around to trade different foods with, perhaps.

You do know, that a garden in reality takes longer to produce food, than in stardew valley?

If a breakdown comes, I am probably busy with other things, than planting seeds and tending to the weeds.

I like gardening, because it gives good fresh food. And not (anymore) because I think I will be better prepared for a post apocalyptical world. I'd rather invest in a hunting rifle for that.

So, knowing that growing food is difficult is good knowledge to have right?

Yes, also knowing how to grow food is good knowledge.

(And I regret a bit my condescending question above)

You're right that it's not realistic for most people to grow enough food to be self-sufficient - but it doesn't take a lot of effort to grow enough food to make a difference.

I usually grow runner beans (8 or 9 plants, and maybe some climbing French beans too) and courgettes (2 or three plants, ideally different varieties) - both of which are high-yield for a relatively small amount of space, and both of which freeze successfully. I really don't have to spend much time on doing that - basically just a case of making sure they have enough water.

I'm now on my last bag of runner beans from last season, and I might actually buy some in about a month's time.

Pumpkins or other winter squash will keep for several months after harvesting provided they reached full maturity before picking, and provided you treat them carefully.

Am I self-sufficient? No, nowhere near it. Have I made a noticeable difference to my food bill? Most definitely.

I do agree that things are harder when you do them then when random people advertise them on the internet.

That being said, things do evolve in time, and while I can't talk about gardening, I find it much easier to host a small website today than 20 years ago, both in terms of personal time and cost. There is a generic fashion to ignore tools and automation in the detriment of "finished products", but even with this, I do feel that tools got better. Not sure it is the case for gardening, but I do wonder if it is not just a matter of initial investment.

> Amounts are too much to consume at once and not enough to consume for longer periods. Putting it into jars is an option but then cost goes up as you need to boil loads of water

This is a strange take. Food preservation methods have been around for hundreds of thousands of years now, there are a myriad of ways to store excess produce, it's not all just about jarring for example.

Most former Soviet families do this every autumn. Storage is the problem, not labor.

> Amounts are too much to consume at once and not enough to consume for longer periods.

This depends on what you grow. Squashes and root vegetables can last for months in a cool dark location at home.