Squash: Possibilities (and Meals) Galore

Squash is easy to grow, and an easy way to get lots of homegrown meals without much effort.  If you've been stuck in a rut of too much zucchini and not enough variety, it's time to explore the many flavors, uses, and kinds of squash.

A refresher on the terms:

The squashes we eat are the fruit of the squash plant. If the fruit grows to full maturity, with a hard shell and mature seeds, it can keep for a long time after picking. Since they can be stored for winter food, they are called winter squash. 

The immature fruits can also be eaten while the skin is still soft and seeds haven't hardened. Some varieties have been selected to be especially tasty at that young tender stage. Varieties eaten when young are called summer squash, or zucchini (which means "little squash" in Italian.) 

Both kinds of squash can be started indoors if your season is short or your garden soil isn't ready. But I usually direct-sow into warm soil after our last frost date. What with one thing and another, I usually don't get them in until June, so don't worry about it too much unless you have an extremely short or cool growing season. The seed-grown plants develop deep, strong root systems that really help in our dry climate. And they catch up quickly with pot-grown starts. 

Squash doesn't need a fine seedbed or perfect soil prep. What they do want is plenty of organic matter. You may have seen a squash plant growing from a compost heap. That combination of fertility, loose texture, warmth, and moisture is squash heaven. The squash bed is the perfect place to bury any organic matter that holds moisture, like weeds, kitchen waste, or manure. (They are good candidates for Hugelkulture (burying wet wood) as well.) If you screen out the chunks in your compost for crops like lettuce and cabbage, you can put the chunky bits on the squash bed. Squash can eat most anything. The plants are big enough to romp over a few clods, rocks, or weeds, but mulch will help keep weeds from going to seed as well as holding moisture in the soil and reducing pests and disease. Dead leaves or straw make a good mulch.

Summer squash may run out of steam in late summer, so plan on giving it a boost with some compost or fish emulsion in August. A trick worth knowing is to put weeds into a bucket, fill it with water, and let it sit for 3-10 days, until the weeds start to decompose. This makes a wonderful liquid food for a midseason boost. (And a great way to use weeds you'd rather not put into the compost.) Or you can plant new seedlings in mid-summer for late production.

Summer Squash

Zucchini are famously productive, and that's a good thing, in spite of all the jokes about trying to get rid of them. There are several reasons people get swamped with them, and each has a solution.

• It's easy to plant too many in the first place, especially if you have seedlings you've started in pots. Who wants to compost the little plants you've nurtured? But think of all the food you could grow in that space, and all the grocery bills you could eliminate if you plant more kinds of things. Better to be realistic about your needs and give the seedlings to a neighbor, your chickens, or the compost pile. Or pot them on into bigger pots to have as spares.
  
• Pick zucchini at a smaller size. The ones in the store are too big for best flavor. If you pick them at 6" or less the flavor and texture will be optimum. (In Italy they're picked while the flower is still attached.) You might eat 3 small ones per person instead of one, so they disappear fast.
• There are more summer squash flavors than just green zucchini. If you're used to grocery-store zucchini, you might not know how flavorful and good a variety like Cocozelle or Zapallo can be. Shape, flavor, and texture do vary somewhat.
• Most cooks in this country don't have a large repertoire of zucchini recipes. If your resources don't go beyond watery boiled zucchini and zucchini bread, get some Italian recipes. We love them fried, roasted, or cooked on the grill instead of boiled. We use them all summer as the basis for a pasta sauce. Have you ever tried them mashed with a bit of milk and butter, Southern-style? Or curried? Or lightly steamed or boiled and then marinated in olive oil and lemon for a cold summer salad? Just cut in halves or quarters lengthwise, drizzle with oil, and run under the broiler or put in the oven while something else bakes. That way they make a great side dish or snack, alone or with dip. In addition to cookbooks, there are several YouTube channels devoted to authentic Italian home cooking.
• Most people don't know they can preserve zucchini for the winter. They freeze well after cooking (not just blanched like other vegetables.) You could make a big batch of roasted or mashed zucchini, or some tomato-zucchini pasta sauce, and freeze it. You can also dry squash, which is what the Native American people who originally cultivated it did. Carol Deppe developed her Goldini summer squash especially for drying. She uses the dried slices all winter in soups and stews. If you don't want to bother with preserving, read on. Winter squash is the crop for you.

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Winter Squash

One rule of thumb I use is not to plant a lot of something unless it can be stored or preserved for the rest of the year. So we plant more dry storage beans than green beans. We plant more sauce tomatoes than cherry tomatoes. And more winter squash than summer squash. Like dry beans, these require no processing or preserving. They require no special storage or infrastructure--no root cellar, freezer, or refrigerator. They keep at room temperature. They keep longest in a very dry place with good air circulation. Like a kitchen shelf, under a table, or on the attic floor.  

If your perfect spot is hard to access, opt for the less-than-perfect place where you'll actually use them! First, use those that are slightly immature, have soft spots or cuts, or got nipped by frost. Then store the rest in an airy place and check them every so often. Actually, check them when you pick one up for dinner. And don't forget to keep eating them. They are one of the sweet, creamy joys of winter.

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Pepita Pumpkins are in a class by themselves. They take all season and grow to maturity like a winter squash. But then you cut them open and harvest the seeds, instead of storing the squash itself. Who doesn't want a tasty nutty snack food you can grow yourself?



When you pick which winter squash to plant, select a pair--one for early eating September through December, and one long-keeper for January-May.

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Fall types don't need more than about 2 weeks of curing (sitting at room temperature) for great flavor, so you can use them soon after harvest. They keep about 3 months--into December or January. Delicata and Acorn squash both fill that slot. Both are quite sweet, and perfect for one or two servings. When I worked in an office, I used to bring one and microwave it in the break room for a sweet afternoon treat.

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The long-storing types store up to 8 months and tend to be bigger.  Cooked squash reheats with no loss of flavor. I like to bake a big squash and freeze some, or use it in different dishes over the week. They are great for soup, gnocchi, pie, and other recipes as well as just baked or roasted. Our varieties range from a drier, more potato-like texture (Stella Blue) to a creamier more yam-like texture (Oregon Homestead). None are as dry as the Hubbards on the one hand or as moist as many pumpkins or French squashes on the other--I like a balanced, versatile texture. 

Moschata (butternut) types are most popular in the market because they store and ship well, peel easily, and have very firm, smooth, moist flesh. They tend to be a bit bland, but I've picked ours  for best flavor. South Anna Butternut is very sweet and very disease-and-pest-resistant. Canada Crookneck has a rich, excellent flavor, and matures most quickly. I also love the long, seedless neck, which is so easy to use in the kitchen.

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Maxima types are especially sweet and fine-flavored when fully mature. Lower Salmon River is one of the sweetest, one of the earliest, and also one of the longest-keeping. I've had them last over winter until June. Carol Deppe's Oregon Homestead was selected for three things: great flavor, small seed cavity (more meat,) and the ability to sprout and grow when direct-sown into cold mud. Carol tells the story of breeding this squash (and the tons of squash she tasted in the process,) in her wonderful book The Resilient Gardener. Stella Blue was bred in Humboldt County California from Japanese types like Kubocha and Kuri squash. It's very sweet and rich in flavor, dry in texture. All of these are gourmet-quality treats.

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A NOTE ON SEED SAVING
I always include the species in variety descriptions in case you save seed. There are three species of squash common in the US. Plants of the same species will cross with each other--but not with other species. If you are not saving seed, you can grow all kinds with no worries--they won't affect each other.

If you are saving seed, you can grow one variety of each species.  Each species has both summer and winter types.  For example, you could grow Pepita pumpkins for edible seeds (C. pepo), Zapallo  summer squash (C. maxima) and Butternut winter squash (C. moschata) together in one garden with no crossing. (assuming no near neighbors with squash.)

If you have ever grown pumpkins and zucchini in the same garden and saved seed, you've probably experienced the "pumpkini"--with hard seeds and watery tasteless flesh. If you want to save seed from zucchini, choose a maxima squash like Lower Salmon River or Oregon Homestead instead of a regular Halloween pumpkin (the flavor's better anyway!) You could also grow a moschata like Canada Crookneck or Butternut without crossing issues. (Remember, too, that to save seed you have to let some fruits mature fully, to the point where the skin is hard and the seeds are mature.)

These are Cucurbita pepo:

These are Cucurbita maxima:

These are Cucurbita moschata: