I ate Casper

[digitS']

Well, half of Casper, anyway.

With the TEG gardeners, I imagine most of you are thinking that Casper is kind of a strange name for a rooster. Well yeah, but I ate half of a Casper Pumpkin as my lunchtime soup ...

It was the smallest pumpkin in the patch and weighed about 2½# but only one bowl of soup was needed. There was just ½ cup of microwaved pulp from half of that pumpkin! Disappointing but I had enough additions (& crackers) to beef it up to a bowlful. Most of the pumpkin was seeds and the fiber around them.

Casper is supposed to be a good choice for the kitchen. This one wasn't - just not enough meat! The flavor was okay.

My thinking is that pumpkins are a neglected vegetable in US gardens. And, they that can replace zucchini in recipes with great success. It's true even with Jack o'lantern pumpkins. It has been true with the Rock Stars that I usually grow and I hope it's true with the Autumn Gold and Montana Jack that I have this year ... having forgotten to order Rock Star seeds .

Pumpkin for zucchini bread is a tasty choice but so is soup and I'm much more interested in pumpkin for that than zucchini, just as a personal preference. Next, will be a mushroom zucchini soup recipe with the other half of Casper.

Steve

 

[buckabucka]

I didn't grow pumpkin but I like sweet winter squash in a soup. I make one with red lentils, ginger, turmeric, and other curry spices. It's a good soup for the winter.

 

[digitS']

Winter squash have a much more appealing flavor.

I suppose that there is little reason to grow pumpkins beyond the Halloween traditional use.

Pumpkin seed oil is likely to be beyond most people's capabilities. My emphasis on them might just be a defense because I don't like zucchini. I'm also "frugal." Having a practical use for a few of the extras, pleases me.

Steve

 

[digitS']

Yes, I have bought and eaten pumpkin seed. Somehow, I've never done anything with ones from my own pumpkins.

Do you know that there is a Cantaloupe Seed Drink? Pumpkin seeds can be used this way, too. I'm behind the curve!

Google Horchata de Melón. Strange idea!

Steve

 

[buckabucka]

very strange. I have one melon left in the refrigerator. If it hasn't gone by, then maybe I will try it (with apologies to the chickens, - they love those seeds).

 

[ducks4you]

Winter squash have a much more appealing flavor.

I suppose that there is little reason to grow pumpkins beyond the Halloween traditional use.

Pumpkin seed oil is likely to be beyond most people's capabilities. My emphasis on them might just be a defense because I don't like zucchini. I'm also "frugal." Having a practical use for a few of the extras, pleases me.

Steve

NO, NO, NO!!! Pie pumpkins are sooooo tasty!! TraDITIONALLY, they were food and it was one of the many native foods that Squanto taught the pilgrams to grow!! (Also, many pest insects that attack them were brought to
this country afterwards...like the Japanese beetle is an unwanted alien species.) I have a severe problem with squash bugs and SVB's. I have to plant late to avoid the SVB's bc they will decimate my squash. Even planting late this year I still had squash bugs, BUT, they weren't anywhere as big a problem. Therefore, it diminishes my pumpkin growing season. I have a huge pumpkin vine, several grey pumpkins, I am spraying with a mix of Dawn and water, and I am willing to cover them after the first frost, which is predicted (Farmer's Almanac) to be a week late this year, though I will still watch the weather.

 

[catjac1975]

I love Rumbo. Some seed catalogs call it a squash and some a pumpkin. I roast it as a vegetable, make cream of pumpkin/squash soup with it and make pumpkin pie. None better. They are extremely prolific.

 

[digitS']

This is the first pumpkin I have grown that is supposed to be good for cooking. Therefore, I don't really know ...

However, I have been very pleased with pies from C. maxima winter squash for decades.

Casper looks like it will prove to be a little too immaterial for me to have much appreciation for it.

Steve

 

[digitS']

I was curious about the origins of squash. It seems to be grown everywhere and even be a part of "traditional" cuisines but, is it entirely of New World origin?

It is: winter and summer squash are from the Americas. Okay, which one did the English find in Massachusetts? "C. mosckata and C. pepo had been carried over all parts of North America where they could be grown." C. maxima: "At the time of the Spanish conquest it was found growing in such areas (northern Argentina near the Andes, or in certain Andean valleys) and has never since been found elsewhere except as evidently carried by man." LINK

Okay, so we may not know if the Indians of Massachusetts were sharing a C. mosckata like @catjac1975 's or a jack o'lantern C. pepo.

Steve
who just had his Casper & mushroom soup