Farmer tip: get cooking to cut your food costs

Chatham- Kent farmer Louis Roesch applauds food banks for a wonderful and necessary job during tough times, but he shakes his head at how households struggling to make ends meet rely so heavily on canned and packaged food products.

“People need to learn about cooking — for the price of a can of beans you can get a bag of beans for almost the same price,” said Roesch, who raises hogs and chickens (for meat and eggs) and grows navy beans and other cash crops.

At his farm gate Roesch Meats and More retail store, a 100-pound bag of beans goes for $40.

Combine some of those beans with smoked pork hocks — selling for less than the approximately $2.20 per pound for a side of pork — and “you've got an excellent meal that's unbelievably inexpensive.”

That's just one example, he said, but it illustrates how fresh foods are not only more nutritious than processed, but can also be cheaper.