Looking to embrace self-sufficient living and reduce your reliance on supermarkets? These practical, no-BS strategies will help you source, grow, and preserve your own food without sacrificing modern convenience.
Modern conveniences are great. I’m not about to pretend I don’t enjoy the luxury of grabbing a rotisserie chicken at the store when I don’t feel like cooking.
But the reality is? Grocery stores aren’t as reliable as we’d like to believe. Supply chain issues, inflation, and even just the absolute circus that is shopping during the holidays make the idea of relying a little less on them pretty damn appealing.
1. Start a Kitchen Herb Garden. You don’t need a yard. A windowsill works fine. Fresh basil, rosemary, and thyme at your fingertips? Yes, please.
2. Buy Local & Seasonal When You Can. Support farmers markets, small butcher shops, and local dairies. The food is fresher, your money stays in your community, and you’re not relying on avocados that took a cross-country road trip to get to you.
3. Learn to Cook from Scratch. Ditch the boxed pancake mix, you don’t need it. Homemade soup? It blows the canned stuff out of the water. Cooking from scratch gives you more control over your food, helps you adapt when ingredients are scarce, and makes everything taste better.
4. Preserve Food (Without It Taking Over Your Life). You don’t need to can 100 quarts of tomatoes. But learning to freeze, dehydrate, ferment, or even can a few things? Super handy when prices skyrocket or your favorite ingredient is suddenly impossible to find.
5. Join a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture). This gets you a regular box of local, seasonal produce. Supporting small farms and reducing your reliance on mass-produced grocery store options.
6. Learn Basic Foraging. No, you don’t need to go full survivalist. But knowing what edible plants grow near you (like dandelions, wild garlic, or berries) is both fascinating and genuinely useful.
7. Get Fresh Eggs (Whether you raise chickens or not). Raising backyard chickens isn’t for everyone (they’re pricey and a lot of work), but fresh eggs are worth it. If keeping chickens isn’t an option, connect with a local farmer or a friend with an overabundance. There’s always someone with too many eggs during peak laying season.
8. Start a Vegetable Garden (Even If It’s Just Containers) Lettuce, radishes, peppers, tomatoes. Grow what you’ll actually eat. Even a few pots on a balcony can cut down on your grocery bill.
9. Find a Local Milk Source. Raw or not, finding milk from a small dairy or farm is usually higher quality and supports local agriculture instead of factory farming.
10. Make Your Own Bread (Or At Least Learn How). You don’t have to do it every day, but knowing how to make a simple loaf of bread is a game-changer when store shelves are empty or prices skyrocket.
11. Batch Cook & Freeze Meals. Cook once, eat multiple times. Having homemade meals in your freezer means fewer last-minute grocery runs and less reliance on takeout.
12. Brew Your Own Herbal Teas. Skip the overpriced tea bags. Grow or forage chamomile, mint, lemon balm, or rose hips for delicious homemade tea blends.
13. Make Your Own Yogurt, Butter, or Cheese. If you have access to good milk, DIY dairy is surprisingly easy. Start with yogurt, it’s basically milk and patience.
14. Hunt or Fish (Or Barter With Someone Who Does). Wild game and fish = free, sustainable protein. And if you don’t hunt? Find someone who does and trade for meat.
15. Render Your Own Cooking Fats. Lard, tallow, and schmaltz are better for you than seed oils and can be made at home if you buy meat with fat trimmings.
16. Learn Basic Canning (Even If It’s Just Jam or Pickles). No need for a prepper pantry, but having homemade pickles or jam on hand? Amazing.
17. Swap Disposable Paper Products for Reusables. Cloth napkins, kitchen towels, and reusable containers mean fewer grocery store runs for disposable stuff.
18. Start Making Your Own Candles & Salves. Beeswax or tallow candles? Easy. Herbal salves for dry skin or cuts? A useful skill and a great gift.
19. Raise Meat Rabbits (If You Have the Space & Stomach for It). A practical option for high-quality meat in a small space. Bonus: their manure is excellent fertilizer.
20. Keep a Stocked Pantry of Basics. Flour, rice, beans, canned goods, salt, sugar... having staples on hand means fewer emergency grocery runs.
21. Learn How to Sew & Mend Clothes. Fast fashion sucks. Knowing how to fix a rip or hem your own pants keeps your wardrobe functional without constant replacement.
22. Build a Simple Root Cellar or Cold Storage Area. Not just for doomsday preppers, a cool, dark storage spot can extend the life of potatoes, apples, and other produce.
23. Learn Herbal Remedies & First Aid. Basic herbal knowledge means you can treat minor illnesses without always reaching for over-the-counter meds.
24. Make Fermented Foods (They’re Good for You & Easy to Store). Sauerkraut, kimchi, or homemade vinegar = gut health and food preservation in one.
25. Stop Overcomplicating It. Self-sufficiency isn’t about doing everything yourself. It’s about learning useful skills, making small shifts, and being intentional. You don’t need to quit grocery shopping forever. Just start where you are.
Want more feral, practical, no-BS seasonal skills? Follow along:
- Facebook at @the Rustic Elk
- Instagram @TheRusticElk.
More Wild Food & Hands-On Traditions to Check Out:
marie says
Hi Danielle,
I just read the About you section and saw that you are or wanting to move to Montana. Have you yet? We live in western Montana, where are you thinking of moving to?? It is a wonderful place to live.
Danielle McCoy says
Hi Marie,
We actually used to live in Montana. We just desperately want to return. We were in the Gallatin Valley and want to return. Probably closer to Missoula, though. Just trying to find our perfect piece of homesteading land and sell our home here in Indiana ?.
marie watson says
Well then you know it is a wonderful place to be!! I love about 60 miles south of Missoula, on the Bitterroot Valley.If you are not familiar, look into it.
Danielle McCoy says
Yes, I know how wonderful Montana is, we miss it something fierce. Can't wait to get back out that way. We've looked in that area, lots of beautiful, open land to decide upon!
Dee says
Yes, I think you got it all and I agree with you.. most stuff you buy in the store isn't good for you anyway.. I am working on this to.. we did have chickens.. but we had to get rid of them it got to were we couldn't find the organic gmo free feed and what we could get off line was to expensive. I try to be all Organic gmo free.. so I don't want to eat eggs or meat from something being fed chemical foods... so now we get a fishing and hunting license, we can get all the rabbits and quail we want we go way out where there are no cars, fields that get sprayed ect.. and once in a while we get a deer tag.. but haven't got a deer yet.. there are to many people around hunting even an hour or two away. I love gathering.. but you have to go way off the main roads and walk at least 50 ft away from where cars drive through so you can get wild foods without the fumes from the car exhaust.. ( I like going even further out because wind can blow stuff out a ways).. You can grow your own herbs.. Dandelion root or even leaves tea is very good to start , you can find them all over the place...( it will detox your liver and kidneys, water retention, among other things, and it is good for cancer as a curative and prevention).. I love herbs and they are very good for you.. also organic coconut oil is very good for you.. You can by organic coconut flakes at the health food store and make your own coconut milk.. it is easy.. I love homemade everything lol... I have a mill to mill my organic gmo free wheat and make my own bread.. Grow a huge garden every year and do a lot of canning and dehydrating.. I use vinegar of a lot of the cleaning you can even use it in the laundry ( the smell rinses out, you can use lavender, lilac ect. for your rinse water.. same for your hair.. 🙂
Danielle McCoy says
There are tons and tons of ways to be more self-sufficient and avoid the store. We hunt and fish. The last couple of years have been very lean hunting seasons for us as well. It hurts our pocketbook severely because local, grass fed beef is not a cheap way to eat. We don't have room for cattle and we can't legally have chickens. These things are on the list for our move back to Montana.
We are going to be foraging here in a couple of weeks once this weather straightens up. You definitely have to get out and away to forage. Dandelions are one of my favorite, but you have to watch because so many people treat them with weed and feed type solutions and you don't wanna eat that ;).
Thank you for sharing how you are becoming more self-sufficient with me :).
Linda Rieke says
I currently do 7 of those things including gardening, preserving, chickens, cloth diapering and milking my own cows. Not sure how much more I could physically do but if there were more hours in the day, I certainly would!
Danielle McCoy says
Oh, if only! That's why it is important to have community :). No one can do it all alone, no matter how hard we try or how much we want to.
Denise Jackson says
I love this article, moving into my retirement home and can't wait to implement these suggestions, thanks
Danielle McCoy says
Glad you liked it, I hope it helps you along the way :).
Margaret says
We lice in Eastern MT and our grocery store is 3 hours away so needless to say we try to go a little as possible. We live on a ranch so we have lots of meat resourced and we have chickens. We grind our own whole wheat flour from what's grown on the ranch but have to buy white flour...I just can't do that dense whole wheat bread!! Also have a big garden and can/dehydrate/freeze/root celllar as much as possible. I really try to have to buy as little as possible at the store but it's amazing how much we still walk out with! Thanks for the fun article and good luck!
Danielle McCoy says
It sounds like you are pretty good at avoiding it and you wouldn't have to go if you couldn't! That's a step in the right direction. t've grown accustomed to whole wheat bread, but we definitely use all purpose, white flour for a lot of things as well. Thanks for sharing :).
Tabitha says
Plant apple trees. If you can, plant lemon trees. Without at least apples, you can't make that all important apple cider vinegar.
Mieke says
I would add in learn how to brew as in Gingerbeer, kombucha, Wine, beer. Learn how to distill for both pure alcohols, oils and spirits. Learn how to make stock, ferments, learn to substitute refined products for raw products, and whole products instead of extracts. Learn what is truly edible from your vegetables (i.e pumpkin leaves, beetroot leaves, etc.) Just to name a few others. 🙂
Danielle McCoy says
Thank you, Mieke. Great ideas!
Andrea says
@Mieke, I just want to add caution to your post. Distilling spirits can be very dangerous if you don't do it right. A lovely woman in our community lost her life doing this.
Dianne Burns says
How about the pets in the house? I know that there are lots of pet foods at the supermarket and they are very pricey. I have one cat that is very sensitive to grains and I have 2 others that are not, so they all get grain free food. I'm thinking about mixing it with cooked chicken.
Danielle McCoy says
Hi, Dianne. We don't purchase commercial pet food. We feed our dog a species appropriate, raw diet. The only feed we buy is for livestock :).
Kendra says
This is a fantastic article! So inspiring. I also try to find anyway I can to limit grocery trips and save money, but I've never even questioned if I could go without it! You have a fan in me.
Danielle McCoy says
Thank you, Kendra! I'm so glad you're inspired!
Sam says
Great article, we are trying to reduce our dependency on supermarkets by growing and hunting more. It’s definitely an eye opener to what we waste our money on! Keep up the great work. From Hampshire, UK
Patricia says
Do you still live in Indiana? If so, where? we live in Trafalgar, right near the Johnson County, Brown County line. Would love to meet up with you.
Danielle McCoy says
Hi, Patricia! We do live in Indiana in Wabash County.
Tami Tiller says
@Danielle McCoy, I'm not that far from you, then. I have cousins in LaFountaine and I live in Hartford City (south of Fort Wayne, north of Indy).
Holly Whiteside says
I like your article very much! Two of my interests are avoiding plastics and supporting local agriculture and small businesses, so I'm also trying to stay out of the supermarkets. I've been going to the farmer's market, gardening, and doing a lot of DIY including canning, yogurt, sourdough, some cheese, dehydrating, some personal care, but I'm having difficulty sourcing some items without plastic in my area: dry beans, some grains. What are you and other readers doing for grains and beans?
Sandra Wages says
Hi! Just joined the group. You can grow your own dry beans ie; pinto, navy ect. Or if you only want to buy 1x per yr or ev/other year, we live in Oregon and buy in bulk at either "Winco" mrkt or at the restaurant supply store "Cash and Carry". We can buy 25lb. And 50lb bags there and can be dry canned for storage. The bean bag can be reused as has a zipper.
Kim says
Would love it nobody to ask ?and where the food comes from.
Mrs R D Mouncer says
Some of these ideas translate really well outside the US, but here in the UK you pay a lot and you need a licence to go fishing, and you can't keep them! Except for sea-fishing. Hunting is the preserve of the very wealthy and requires a gun-licence and the landowners permission. There's also seasons for everything. No-one here has the space for chickens or meat-rabbits, anyone with a property big enough doesn't need them! But grow your own? Absolutely!
Danielle McCoy says
Not all of these suggestions will translate to every individual, regardless of location. They are simply suggestions that you can use to decrease your dependency on the store. Do what you can, where you are is my mantra.
Roberta says
Hi Danielle,
I just read your article on living without the grocery store. along with all the great things you mentioned, like bee keeping, did you know that honey is also a great antibiotic for cuts and scrapes?