When I planted the cucurbits in May, I simply mixed up all the tag-ends of various seed packets and opted for pot-luck-surprise when it came to germination. Unfortunately, of the 13 plants that came up, just 2 were courgettes and the rest appear to be pumpkins! No sign of the hubbards or summer squash or cucumbers which I also planted; clearly my seeds have been hanging around for too long…
Apart from the lack of variety, planting direct into the compost heaps has been a great success and the plants are all RAMPANT and trying to climb out of the compost heap and take over the world!!
One or two pumpkin plants are OK, but 11 is quite a lot and there are already dozens of yellow balls maturing in the sun. Faced with the possibility of having to carve over a hundred halloween pumpkin faces, I panicked and decided we should start eating them as soon as possible. So baby pumpkin is now on the menu. I’ve tried roasting them whole in the oven – just drizzle olive oil over fist-sized pumpkins and bake hot for 25 minutes – they are sweet, juicy and delicious and you can eat the whole thing (i.e. no need to remove seeds!).
Scarlet said
(I’ve also chucked a couple over the chicken fence and the chickens go crazy for them!)
Family Smudge said
YUM! I like to roast them until they are a little soft, cut the top off, scoop out some of the middle and mix in a pan of ’stuff’ ie: veg curry, mince – that kind of thing. Stuff it all back in and roast some more … really lovely. As I haven’t had an oven for six months I am absolutely drooling at the thought!!!!!
Scarlet said
That does sound tasty, although every time I think about stuffing small vegetables like that I can’t help hearing my mother-in-law saying, “Life’s too short to stuff a mushroom”!!!
Family Smudge said
I hear what you’re saying but boy – you can’t beat big flat mushrooms bubbling with cheese and herbs!!! Life is just too short not to!!!!
howlingduckranch said
My latest tactic with over-achieving zucchinis and squashes is to use their flowers; knocking them back at the flowering stage is the way to go! Use them for soup, stuffing cheese into and poaching, deep frying and the like. Yummy.
Daftest Vegetable 2008 « The chickens have escaped! said
[...] have been delicious and very productive (so much so we ate lots when they were small) and the ones I left have grown to a good size, just right for making pumpkin heads on Halloween. [...]