The economics of growing my own food

I will not kid myself that all the hours I spend tending my garden provide me with a lot of economic return.  I do it mostly because I enjoy the challenge and the fruits of my labors.  The tomatoes I grow myself taste ever so much sweeter than the ones from the store, even more so because I have tended so many tomato plants that have yielded not one ripe tomato.  But every year my garden gets better, more efficient as I learn.  

But besides the pure pleasure and enjoyment I am getting out of my garden, sometimes I wonder what is the monetary value of my work.  This was acutely brought to my attention last Sunday when Matt and I bought four cabbages (because the moose had eaten all of ours) and some pickling cucumbers (because we aren't very good at growing them yet) at a farm stand out in Palmer.  I love supporting our local farmers, but I almost choked when Matt handed over $27.  I felt completely inadequate as the provider of our vegetables.  So, I have started to pay more attention to what I'm eating and putting away for the winter.  

I packaged up just over 5 pounds of blanched kale (from my mother's garden because the moose ate ours.)  It took me about 5 minutes to harvest and 25 minutes to wash, blanch, package, label, and freeze it.   That is not taking into account the time it took to plant and tend the kale, which is a more complicated calculation.  A bunch of organic kale from Freddies is, what, $2.50?  So, if a bunch of kale is about a pound ( I should check these numbers) then I froze the equivalent of about $12.50.  If we pretend that it took about another half-hour of tending for those five bunches of kale, then the hourly rate would be about $12.50.  Not stellar, but it is something.  And the carbon footprint of the kale is much smaller than the stuff that comes from Cali in the dead of winter.  

Perhaps the raspberries will be more economical.  I spent about 15 minutes collecting about a pint of raspberries today.