Category Archives: Squashes – Courgettes & Pumpkins

Whether you’re sowing, growing or cooking squashes (cucumbers, pumpkins, courgettes), this is where you’ll find more information on them.

Another soup recipe? This time it’s different. This time it’s the Prince of Squash

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Winter squash harvest

Winter squash harvest

This week we carved five squash/pumpkins to celebrate Hallowe’en – one of which was one of my precious Crown Prince squash varieties.

Grown this year from seed, I’ve watched three grow and develop and there’s a part of me that didn’t want to slice and bake the tasty fruit. Although the skin is a grey/blue, the flesh inside is a rich orange in colour and once roasted is one of the tastiest squash we’ve ever had the pleasure of eating. It develops a deliciously sweet chestnut flavour and when made into a soup is simply divine. As we were scooping out the flesh the scent of melons filled the kitchen, reminding us of the Crown Princes’ relationship with the rest the Cucurbita family.

Crown Prince Squash

Crown Prince Squash

If you’ve yet to grow a Crown Prince, I heartily recommend you try it next year as they’re easy to grow (instructions here) and are great for winter storage. If you haven’t grown them, try sourcing them in a farmers market – I bought my first one last year from a local organic farm gate.

This is my third recipe for a squash or pumpkin soup on the blog and the tastiest yet. The reason I keep posting them isn’t for their amazing flavour – pumpkin can be quite bland on its own, more that I’m hoping it’ll encourage you to use the flesh!

In my previous life before children, I’d scoop out the seeds and flesh before carving pumpkins and composting them. That was it. I was too scared to try cooking them and didn’t have a clue what to do with the flesh. In fact I have a vague recollection of thinking what a waste of food, there must be something I could make with it, but it wasn’t until I became a budget conscious mum and starting cooking more than mushroom curries that I found out what to do with it.

Given that there’s only so much squash soup a family can make, this year we’ll also be making pumpkin muffins based on the courgette cake recipe and will be roasting some of the seeds. I spotted this recipe for cocoa roasted pumpkin seeds on twitter from the Food to Glow blog and will be giving it a go.

Ingredients

Diced flesh from a Crown Prince squash
2 medium potatoes, diced
1 onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, chopped
1.5 ltrs vegetable stock
25g butter
Lots of finely grated nutmeg to taste
freshly ground salt & pepper
150 ml milk

Carefully cut the top from the squash and scoop out the seeds and fibrous contents. You can’t save and plant the seeds from a squash such as Crown Prince as it’s an F1 variety (meaning that whatever you grow wont be like its parent). Rinse and place the seeds to one side so that you can make the cocoa roasted snack when the oven’s hot. Using a spoon, scrape out as much flesh from the squash as you can without damaging the outer shell. Place the empty shell to one side ready for carving. Spread out the pumpkin flesh on a roasting tray and bake in a pre-heated oven at 175ºC for about an hour.

Once roasted, melt the butter and cook the onion gently for 5 minutes in a covered saucepan, without colouring.  Add the potato, roasted squash and vegetable stock.  Cover, bring to the boil and simmer gently for about 20 mins until the vegetables are tender.  Cool a little, then purée in a liquidiser.  Return to a clean saucepan and stir in the milk, grated nutmeg and salt and pepper to taste.

Pour the soup into the empty shell for serving if you’re not planning on carving it.

Do you have any favourite squash recipes or links you’d like to share?

Crown Prince Squash

Crown Prince Squash

Courgette (Zucchini) Soup Recipe

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This is a revamped blog post from a couple of years ago that is a favourite recipe in our house and a great way of using up lots of courgettes or zucchini as they’re known in most other parts of the world. It originated from The New Covent Garden Food Co Book of Soups.

Without the added Brie the soup is tasty (though on the thin side) and makes a quick lunch which my children often ask for when they spot a courgette laying on the counter top. We often leave out the cheese as it’s not an ingredient that’s generally in our fridge unless it’s been written down on the shopping list. However, if you’re looking for a thicker soup with that *something* extra to share with friends, do add it as it makes all the difference.

Zucchini (Courgette) Soup

In the photo above the Brie was omitted and Parmigiano cheese added to the soup after it had been blended, along with a shot of cream (which for the life of me I can never get into that pretty swirl that chefs seem to manage! Mine resembles a distorted map of America!)

Recipe Serves 6

450g (1lb) sliced courgettes

1 onion, peeled and sliced

knob of butter

350g potatoes (about 2 medium)

1.2 ltrs vegetable stock

freshly grated salt and pepper

*optional

225g Brie, peeled and rind removed, or grated Parmigiano

Melt the butter in a large saucepan and add the chopped onion, cooking until it’s soft and slightly caramelised. Add the remaining ingredients, bring to the boil and simmer gently for around 15 minutes or until the vegetables are tender. If using the Brie, stir in now and cook until it’s melted. Remove the pan from the heat and allow to cool slightly. Puree in a liquidiser if you have one. Remember not to put the cap over the lid if blending hot liquids as it’s like to explode! Instead fold a cloth and cover the top.

Serve up the soup with lots of bread and grated cheese of any description if you’re not using the Brie.

What’s your favourite home-made soup?

Seeds and the Joy of Spring

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True Leaves Form on a Brussels Sprout Seedling

I used to think I was an autumn kind of girl until I started gardening and discovered the joy of spring.

After a burst of activity that involves sorting through the seed tin, ordering new seeds and excitedly opening the post box when they arrive, life settles for a few weeks until the light  increases and the temperatures rise. Towards the end of February it’s time to get busy     again. A quick drive to the garden centre to buy fresh new seed compost, washing modules, making newspaper pots and sorting through the shed is quickly followed by the first seed sowing session.

Courgette (left) Crown Prince (right)

Most vegetable seeds bar roots can generally be started off in trays and modules – it gives them a head start, protects the tiny seedlings from slugs and snails and means that when the weather improves the seedlings can be transplanted to their final growing positions, shortening the growth period and freeing up space in the garden for follow-on crops (or in the case of tomatoes, giving them time to ripen and turn red!).

Heated Propagating Bench

This year was the first using my heated propagating bench and has been a delight to observe. With the thermostat set at 18-20oC, the seeds have germinated much quicker than on my windowsills.

Each morning, as I pop outside in my PJs to open up the polytunnel for the day, allowing the fresh air to move around it, I’ve had the pleasure of observing the tiny stems  push their way through the

Cauliflower Seedling

Calendula Seed

compost, discarding their cozy seed shells like old jumpers that no longer fit. Each morning this spring I’ve started the day with a smile.

As the shoots quickly develop their first cotyledon leaves so that they can start the process of photosynthesising, feeding and urging the tiny seedling towards the light to grow bigger and stronger, this to me is a true sign of spring. I’m watching the wondrous birth of

Winter Squash

new life and its magical.

Once the seed leaves open fully, the true leaves start to grow, taking on the characteristics of their adult form. The roots get stronger and more prolific, giving you the nod that it’s time to move the seedlings from their tiny modules into bigger pots.

This is when you learn the importance of labelling as to an untrained eye, it’s impossible to tell a Brussels sprout from a cauliflower, or a ‘One Ball’ courgette from a ‘Crown Prince’ winter squash.

Holding the seed leaves gently and moving the seedlings into fresh, dampened multipurpose compost, allowing the little plants to take in more nutrients so they can continue their growth unchecked is a delicate task and forces you to slow things down – this is not a job to be rushed or you risk breaking the delicate stems.

Careful and regular watering throughout this period of growth will ensure strong, healthy plants ready to transplant to their final growing positions in a few weeks time.

 

So I’m a Spring kinda gal. Do you share my delight of this season or do you prefer the heat of summer, the colours of autumn or the frosty mornings of winter?

 

Sowing Seeds ? Paper Potter Product Review

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Image courtesy of  Mary Gettings www.ecoevolution.ie
(fellow Paper Potter fan!)

Last year I tried making newspaper pots for my seeds using a small plastic drinks bottle as a guide but found it quite fiddly, and could never quite get the base to sit correctly.

When I saw the Nether Wallop Plant Potter (great name!) online it was top of my Christmas wish list and I was therefore delighted to find that I had been a good girl after all when I was handed my presents from under the tree.

Some seedlings sulk if their roots are disturbed so they should either be sown directly into the soil (like parsnips and carrots whose roots generally won’t form) or into pots that will biodegrade (beetroot, beans, peas, squash and melons).

I’ve used cardboard tubes (from kitchen or toilet rolls) which work very well too but it’s questionable as to whether the glue used to stick them together is ‘safe’.

If you like to sow your own seedlings, making your own pots out of newspaper is a great money saver (even if you do have the initial small outlay of a wooden potter, better if it’s a gift) and you’ll be doing your bit to help the planet by recycling old newspapers too.

I really enjoy using my little potter. It’s made from FSC oak and beautifully turned, fitting into the hand perfectly. My eight year old made several pots too and loved helping mum – she didn’t want to stop! I was also impressed by the minimalistic packaging. Just a cardboard box with the instructions printed on it – no plastic and compostable – there’s a lesson there for other companies who over package…

There’s not much more I can say other than a great little tool that I’d recommend all gardeners have in their kit bag. These are available online for €11.75 plus postage… If you count up how much can be spent on seedling pots over the years, and the fact that once you have this tool you’ll never run out of them, I think it’s worth it.

If you’re not sure, or are just interested in how to make them, here’s a clip demonstrating how quick and easy paper pots are to make using the Nether Wallop Paper Potter.

Have you an essential piece of kit in your bag that you can’t do without in the garden?