Homegrown food isn’t about cost effective.
It’s about growing food that is better than what can be grown for profit. As the OP explained, these chickens get freedom to roam, eat bugs and even do some hanky panky. This will improve the nutrient profile and reduce negative things like stress hormones.
As for me, I pick my tomatoes when so ripe that they bruise if sit on a counter for a day or so. You can’t sell commercially at that ripeness.
My plants are grown with exotic minerals from the entire world. Bat and bird guanos, volcanic rocks, mineral deposits, kelps, etc. The taste is unbeatable and I’ll bet nutrition is too.
“Homegrown food isn’t about cost effective.”
If one is preparing for emergencies or have a tight budget and wish to reduce the food bill, it is.
I strive to get maximum return for investment of time and money. An example is my vegetable garden. As my goal is to raise as much food as possible in the given amount of area the garden takes to help sustain my family during bad times, I plant that which produces well, vegetables that can be preserved in various manners for long shelf life.
Corn is an example of a vegetable that doesn’t give me enough return. A block of corn takes up a good size area if one wants enough for a few meals. An area that could be used for bush beans, rutabaga, beets, tomatoes and such. Veggies that would produce more in the same area and can be preserved for sometime for later use. I’d be better off buying canned corn at the local DG for $.50 a can then to raise my own. And that canned corn has a shelf life of years.
For protein, I’m further ahead buying inexpensive pinto beans in bulk and going down to the river to fish instead of raising chickens.
Your priority is different then mine as you stress quality and taste and that’s fine. My priority is to produce as much as possible within the confines of what land I have and my physical and financial ability.