OK, I'm lucky: I live in a farmland that Lee invaded in July to feed his army. (All that stuff about going to Gettysburg for shoes is a folktale.) So we have plenty to pick from.

Nevertheless, wherever I've lived -- the list is short -- we've always done better by looking at what grows locally and eating that. In winter everything is a little more expensive because you have to go with the preserved, dried and frozen stuff, but still, unless a person lives in the antarctic, there's enough of the local fresh foods to provide a balanced meal most of the year if you want to go on the cheap. Canning and preserving, dying arts, will preserve budgets as well. Freezing, too.

If the food doesn't have to travel as far, it doesn't cost as much. If you buy it from the farmer or at a farmers' market, it doesn't cost as much either. If you buy less processed dry goods, it doesn't cost as much.

I really look forward to raspberries. We only get them a few weeks a year, picked off the bushes in the backyard, but boy, are they good. I can look forward to them after that, and eat local strawberries, then local peaches, then local pears and grapes, then local apples...

Things taste so good. It keeps local farmers in business too.