10 Best Plants to Grow for Your Budget

Every prospective gardener has their own reasons to try to grow their own food. However, one potential benefit of gardening is to reduce the cost of your family’s grocery bill. Especially in these current days of high food prices.

Actually saving money through gardening, though, depends a lot on picking the right plants to grow. You need to find plants that are relatively expensive to buy at the grocery store and relatively cheap to grow at home. It will also depend on how much space you have to grow in (some plants take more space than others), and of course, how much of different plants you typically buy at the store (can’t save money you’re not already spending!)

But, with all that in mind, here’s a list of the 10 best plants I’ve found to grow for your budget and an estimate of what kinds of savings you might see:

1. Basil (or other herbs)

Fresh annual herbs like basil, parsley, oregano, thyme, sage, cilantro and others are easy to grow in a garden of any size. They work well in containers, raised beds, or backyard gardens. Most of them germinate well, or it’s easy to find seedlings at grocery stores, garden stores or farmers markets.

They are also relatively expensive to buy fresh at the store and don’t store well in the fridge. Also, most recipes use small amounts of herbs at a time, so your herb garden can be continuously harvested all season long. At the end of your growing season you can bring herbs inside or harvest and dry the herbs for wintertime use.

Estimated Savings: $1-$4 per herb per week, $50-$200 per year

2. Lettuce (or other salad greens)

Another fresh food that is easy to grow and doesn’t store well is salad greens. This could be lettuce, spinach, kale, chard, collards, arugula, mustards or whatever else you like in your salad. You can grow them indoors or out, and they are quick to mature with your first harvests of baby leaves in only a few weeks. It’s also easy to set up sequential plantings so you have fresh greens always available – even in the winter!

Pre-washed salad greens are convenient, but they can be pretty expensive per pound to buy every week. Because they only stay fresh for a week or less in the fridge, salad greens are also something that is frequently wasted when bought at the grocery store. Being able to harvest only what you need can cut down on food waste and keep your greens at their nutritional peak. Plus, you can get multiple lettuce harvests from one plant if it is a cut-and-come-again variety.

Estimated Savings: $5 per box of salad per week, $200 per year

3. Beans (or other legumes)

Beans might be an unexpected item to be so high on the list because they are pretty cheap to buy at the store. However, because of their high protein content, substituting home-grown beans for store-bought meat can be a huge grocery bill savings. Also, beans are very cheap to grow in large quantities with one plant from one seed producing 40-200 beans each.

There are lots of different varieties of legumes to choose from, from edamame for snacking, snap peas or snow peas for salads and stir-fry’s, chickpeas or lentils for soups and stews, green beans for casseroles and side dishes, or black or kidney beans for chili. The whole legume family are pretty easy to grow. Most come in bush varieties that could even grow in containers, and they are easy to process, store, or preserve by freezing, canning, pickling, or drying.

Estimated Savings: $1-$2 per can or bag, $50 – $100 per year (more if substituting for meat)

4. Strawberries (or other soft berries)

Strawberries and other soft fruits like raspberries, blueberries, and blackberries are another grocery store item that is very perishable and expensive to transport, so expensive to buy in large quantities. They are also one of the most nutritious types of fruit, so having them in your family’s diet can be a great benefit. They can be purchased frozen, especially when out of season, but are still pretty expensive.

If you have enough space, growing them yourself can be a big cost savings. You typically would buy plants rather than seeds for the best results, but they are still a good investment because the plants are perennials in most climates. Strawberries do really well in containers, but the other cane-type berry plants require outdoor space to grow. All varieties tend to spread, so your berry patch can expand over time without additional cost. All of the berries freeze well, so you can store them out of season, or purchase everbearing varieties with a longer harvest time.

Estimated Savings: $4-$7 per container, $200 – $350 per year

5. Tomatoes

Tomatoes are one of the best foods to grow in your garden as far as the most improved flavor and texture compared to a grocery store version that was picked green and shipped across the country.  However, it can also be a good plant for your budget if you eat a lot of tomato products.  Cans of tomato products are pretty cheap at most grocery stores, but because of their many uses, they may be a frequently purchased item.  Fresh tomatoes are more expensive and the home-grown varieties are so much more tasty that it may be worth growing in your garden for that experience alone.

Tomatoes are relatively easy to grow in almost any space and many varieties have a very high production potential.  One plant can provide a lot of individual fruits, especially the cherry and grape-sized tomatoes.  If you have a decent sized backyard it’s possible to grow literally hundreds of pounds of tomatoes in a summer.

Tomatoes feature in a lot of different foods, so they are a true pantry staple.  You can eat them fresh in salads, tacos, or sliced on sandwiches or cook them into salsas, soups, stews, sauces, or paste.  There are also lots of ways to preserve tomato products from sun-drying, freeze-drying, and dehydrating, to freezing and canning.  Our family grows and freezes over 70 quarts of diced tomatoes each year and by bringing in green tomatoes in the fall to ripen over time, we have fresh tomatoes for salad from July through December.  

Estimated Savings: $0.50 – $3 for cans or jars, $3-$5 for fresh, $50 – $250 per year

6. Cucumbers

Cucumbers are another vegetable that is highly perishable and therefore relatively expensive to buy fresh in the grocery store.  However, they are perhaps more popular in their pickled form which is relatively cheap to buy.  Because pickles can be used in a lot of different ways, they may also be a frequently purchased item for your family.  We love to eat them sliced on salads all year long.

Although there are some common pests that love to eat cucumbers as well, they are usually pretty easy to grow if you have enough space.  The vines can climb a six to eight foot trellis easily, but that also means they have good production potential with lots of cucumbers ripening on each vine.  You can grow them in containers, if they have somewhere to climb and there are bush varieties, but they don’t always produce as much as the bigger plants.

Making your own pickles is also pretty easy to do and lets you pick exactly what flavorings and spices you like.  Because of the high acidity of the vinegar, you can water-bath can them or just make refrigerator pickles that don’t require canning and last for a month or so in the fridge.

Estimated Savings: $1-$3 for fresh, $3-$5 for a pickle jar, $50 – $250 per year

7. Cabbage

Cabbage may be something of an acquired taste for some families, but if you like it, it can be a good budget vegetable because of the very high production to seed ratio.  One plant can grow a 3-5 pound cabbage and once you cut the main head, the plant can continue to grow smaller side-heads before frost.  A single large cabbage can provide bags of shredded cabbage for soups or stews, coleslaw, and one of our family favorites – sauerkraut.  Fresh cabbages aren’t too expensive at the store, but cans of sauerkraut can be proportionately more since one cabbage would produce many cans or jars.

Cabbages are also pretty easy to grow, they can handle cold temperatures and even moderate pest damage without too much trouble.  Once they are harvested, they store well and are easy to preserve.  Plus the flavor and texture of home-made sauerkraut is another experience that could make gardening worth it for some folks.  It’s vastly different than the store-bought version.

Estimated Savings: $1-$3 for cans/jars of sauerkraut, $3-$5 for fresh, $50 – $250 per year

8. Peppers

Sweet or spicy peppers are another item that is relatively perishable, so they can be expensive to buy fresh.  Also, there are a huge variety of peppers you could grow and not all are available in your average grocery store, so if you have treasured family recipes that need specific levels of spiciness, you may have to grow your own.  The plants usually have good production potential and are easy to grow in almost any garden space.  Peppers are also technically perennial plants, so you can bring them inside in the winter and they will keep producing as long as you hand-pollinate the flowers.

Peppers don’t store very well fresh, but they are easy to preserve by dehydrating, freezing, canning in salsa and chutney, or pickling.  Roasting them fresh, peeling and storing in oil makes a great topping for salads and pizzas later in the year.  The wide variety of shapes, colors and flavors make peppers interesting to grow and try new varieties and they are all nutrient dense foods that can add a lot of flavor to your dishes throughout the year.

Estimated Savings: $1-$4 for fresh, $3-$5 for pickled/salsa, $50 – $250 per year

9. Potatoes

Potatoes have been a budget crop literally for centuries or even thousands of years in South America.  Although they are relatively cheap at the store, there are so many different ways you can use them in your cooking that growing your own can replace a big chunk of your groceries.  Replacing baked, boiled, and mashed potatoes is just one area.  There’s also french fries, hashbrowns, soups, stews, even potato chips.  All relatively easy to make yourself from your home-grown spuds.

Potato plants are easy to grow and have a big production potential with 10-15 potatoes possibly coming from one plant if you have good soil.  They are easy to grow in bags or containers.  But, because there are so many ways to use them, you may need a lot of space to grow enough for your whole family for a whole year.  You can also save potatoes for seed from one year to the next or plant sprouting potatoes from the store, reducing startup costs.

Estimated Savings: $3-$6 for fresh, $3-$8 for fries, $150 – $400 per year

10. Pumpkins (or other melons and squash)

Pumpkins, melons, and other squash have to be on this list because of their amazingly high production potential.  One plant produces multiple large fruits and each fruit has hundreds of seeds.  If you buy canned pumpkin at the store for fall treats, it can get expensive easily, but you can get 4-5 cans worth from a single pumpkin.  Also, if you buy whole squash for seasonal decorations, they can be quite expensive with large pumpkins or other squash costing up to $25 each.  

There are a huge variety of plants in the squash family including zucchini, summer squash, acorn, butternut, watermelon, cantaloupe, honey dew, and many more. The “winter squash” varieties are very easy to store, but almost all varieties grow as long vines that need lots of space in a garden.  There are some “bush” varieties of zucchini that can work in a container or small raised bed. They are easy to grow if you aren’t plagued by squash bugs.  So, if your family likes pumpkin spice items, melons, or other squash, growing your own can be a big lift to your grocery bill.

Estimated Savings: $1-$4 for canned, $10-$25 for fresh, $50-$200 per year

So, that’s a lot of different vegetables and fruits that you can consider, and choose ones that your family uses a lot of. If you actually had the space and time to grow all 10, you could be looking at a significant savings in your grocery bill for the year. Of course, you will have to offset that with any garden startup costs for seeds, containers, tools, soil, etc.

Total Possible Savings: $900 – $2500

I hope that gives you some food for thought and the motivation to start a few seeds and see where your garden adventure takes you!