BEING EVER ON THE lookout for thrills in my gardening, I'm always trying new and novel (to me, at least) varieties. This year I tried a couple of new squashes I'd long wanted to try but didn't get round to. I just harvested and ate the first of the many Galeux d'Eysine squashes (or pumpkins) and can report it has a texture and flavor somewhere between a butternut squash and a watermelon. The Fedco catalog quotes Barbara Damrosch as describing it:
This heirloom, hailing from the Bordeaux region of France, was listed by Vilmorin in 1883 as Warted Sugar Marrow. It resurfaced at the Pumpkin Fair in Tranzault, France, in 1996. Shaped like rounded slightly flattened pumpkins, the 15-lb fruits have salmon-peach skins covered with large warts.
Sugar marrow might be a good name for it, it's a bit sweeter than I like and a lot more moist than I usually care for in squash, cooking it cut into small pieces in a microwave is what I'd recommend. I was remembering how, true to the dreadful practices retained from 19th century New England cooking how people boiled squash while thinking if you tried that with this variety it would dissolve into mush.
It also has very large seeds which I intend to eat when they're dried out but haven't tried those yet.
The reason I wanted to grow it was that it - apart from the description of its eating qualities - is so unusual looking. The photo, taken from the Fedco-seeds catalog online is a good representation of what they look like. Perhaps the warts on the skin are one of the reasons they're considered not to be good keepers.
Will I grow it next year? I'm not sure. I think I have a couple of seeds left from the packet so I might though I think I'll try a smaller one that has a better reputation as a keeper for next year, preferably one with a drier, nuttier texture instead of a near watermelon one.
No comments:
Post a Comment