Squashes

[watervole]

There's a lovely row of bright orange squashes and longer, thinner, butternut squashes lining our windowsills.  They're a splash of bright colour in the lounge, and being on the windowsill allows them to ripen.  Ripening is good, as it hardens the rind and ensures they will keep for several months and we'll be eating some of them in the winter.

I love the flavour of squashes.  They're so  versatile in cooking as you can use them for all sorts of things.  They add both colour and flavour to meals.  They add a wonderful background texture to soups and stews, as well of having plenty of other uses.

This is far and away the best crop of squashes that we've ever had, and it's due to Richard's efforts in going down the allotment every morning during the drought and watering them.

Going down first thing in the morning has become a habit.  as long as it isn't raining, we go down every day now and do half an hour's weeding before breakfast.  It's a great way to start the day with some gentle exercise and to come back with  a supply of fresh beetroot and French beans and sweetcorn.

Comments

[decemberleaf.livejournal.com]

Love your description. And Richard's trek to your allotment every morning makes me think of the way I'm trying to use only watering cans, and have done so now for three years even during this summer's one-month drought. This means lots of trekking back and forth from the spigot, but it's a pleasure to see the vegetables perk up, and fortunately for our water supply it keeps me away from my favorite activity: watering rocks to see the colors they turn!

[watervole.livejournal.com]

It's a lot more efficient than using the hose. And watering early in the morning or late in the evening helps reduce the evaporation losses.

[raspberryfool.livejournal.com]

I'm glad that your harvest is going well. My butternuts did poorly this year; I was late germinating them, I've had two female flowers from five vines and only one has set, so here's hoping for a late frost onset. Perhaps the hot weather retarded them a little. Must do better.

OTOH, my tomatoes are cropping well, as are the courgettes / marrows that were supposed to be pumpkins (wrong labelling).

[watervole.livejournal.com]

My tomatoes were a write-off. We tried a blight resistant variety and they took months to germinate. We'd almost abandoned the pots when they finally appeared as seedlings.

Thus, the plants still don't have any fruit, they're only now beginning to flower.

[raspberryfool.livejournal.com]

That's a shame, perhaps you had duff seeds. If your plants produce any fruit that fails to ripen before impending frosts, you can remove these and ripen on a windowsill.

Small plants can be over-wintered indoors if you have the space; they'll get 'leggy', but will be raring to go for next season. It's possible to take cuttings for next season; just remove the sideshoots, place these into pots and they'll root, then grow like crazy in the spring.

Here's wishing you better results for next year.

[vjezkova.livejournal.com]

This is such a lovely "hymn" on squashes! My eyes can imagine them and my mouth is watering - only that I have never cooked them because my boys refuse all these things "a priory", silly ones!

[watervole.livejournal.com]

'a priory'? I haven't a clue what you mean here.

Slip a squash into your next soup or stew (let it go to mush so that it's invisible and vanishes into the background). Then wait for them to ask you what the lovely flavour is from.

[vjezkova.livejournal.com]

Thank you, o clever one!:-)This is the right way how to deal with them!:-)
A priori means that they refuse everything without even giving it a thought...

[watervole.livejournal.com]

I wondered if that was what you meant, but it's an odd way (in English) of using the phrase. (and the 'y' rather than the 'i' was a bit confusing)