In May I started a series with Sarah McMillan at Rootdown Organics and Jennie Helmer at Helmers' Organic Farm, both in Pemberton Valley, to track the tale of two dinners.
One dinner was a gorgeous white Muscovy duck that Jennie was raising amongst a gaggle of ducks and other farm animals that are lovingly cared for on the long-time family farm. The other, a sublime Queensland blue squash that Sarah grew up eating in Australia but had never seen growing. So she decided to try growing it on the new farm she and her partner, Gavin Wright, bought to support their expanding business.
These final chapters in the life of a squash and a duck have proven so rich that I'm giving over the entire column to a single dinner, this week the Queensland blue and next our Muscovy duck.
So far we've tracked the squash from seedling, through a couple of touch-and-go episodes, including a pale and wobbly start in the greenhouse when Sarah thought the seedlings wouldn't make it, and an attack of early blight.
Last time we checked in, it had grown into a bright lime-green fruit on the vine, about the size of half a loaf of bread.
So here's the tail end of the tale as we follow a squash dinner from seed to table top.
NOT PERFECT BUT DELICIOUS
When Sarah McMillan finally cut open her Queensland blue squash to cook it, her first reaction was, oh noooo! It's not ripe enough!
Shaped something like a mini-UFO - a roundish trapezoid about the width of a salad plate on top - a Queensland blue is supposed to be a gorgeous and ghostly slate blue on the outside.
But a light early frost in the middle of a record rainy September made Sarah and Gavin decide to harvest their Queensland blues, along with all their other squashes, ahead of schedule. So all the "blues" were still quite green, like this one - now a rich, deep olive with just a hint of the distinctive blue.
"It's supposed to be have super deep orange flesh, but it was a bit pale and the flesh near the skin was a bit green. But I said, oh heck, I have to cook it anyway and it will be what it will be," Sarah says.
The results were pleasantly surprising - even though it was slightly under ripe the squash was deliciously sweet and tasty, quite complex with some floral undertones.
"It's always a bit of a balance - leave them on the vine as long as possible because they are going to ripen better, but then it's a race before something like powdery mildew sets in," she says.
GETTING THE CURE
From five Queensland blue plants, Gavin and Sarah harvested 13 squash on Sept. 24, almost five months after the seeds were first planted in flats. Of the six varieties of squash planted in two 240-foot rows, the Queensland blue were by far the best producers, plus the fruit were the ripest.
Once winter squash like these are picked, they're set aside to cure and ripen in a dry, warm environment, preferably with sunlight, even if it means storing hundreds of them on every tabletop and windowsill in your house, as Gavin and Sarah did last year.
Curing, which takes about a week, hardens the skin and seals any cuts or openings, allowing them to be stored longer since mould and bacteria can't get in. Properly cured squash can last a year. If they need ripening, the colour darkens and the taste improves with time.
Overall, Sarah's Queensland blues were surprisingly successful given the squash were bred to perform well in the warmer climate of Queensland. And she doesn't know why they outperformed squash commonly grown in this region, like the stalwart butternut and the sweet Delicata.
Also, in the last installment of our tale, the blues weren't doing so well, showing signs of early blight.
Remember that cool wet spring that went on and on until July, when summer struck with a searing vengeance that carried on until the record rainfall in September? Plants like squash that need long growing seasons get walloped when summers are compacted and shoulder seasons are extreme like this year, something scientists have been warning about with climate change - more extreme temperatures; more abrupt changes; more and more intense storms.
But the Rootdowners pampered the Queensland blue, covering the ground with black plastic mulch to reduce weed pressure and keep the soil evenly moist and warm, and covering some rows with white fabric designed to provide a few more degrees of heat.
The effort paid off. The biggest Queensland blue they harvested was about eight pounds, while the one Sarah cooked for dinner was about five pounds. That's big, plus the flesh is very dense.
"That's what I love about squash," says Sarah. "They are such a rewarding thing to grow because you put the seed in the ground, you do what you need to do, which is very little, and then at the end of the season, they produce these massive, heavy-poundage things that you know are going to feed a lot of people, and that's really satisfying. Plus they have an amazing flavour!"
To cook her own-grown Queensland blue, Sarah removed the seeds and chopped it into chunks. Good news for all you people who hate the tedium of peeling squash, you don't have to. The skin is usually tender enough to eat, but wash the outside first.
She then arranged the chunks in a single layer in a roasting pan, drizzled them with olive oil (butter is good too), added a little salt and pepper, and roasted them at 350 degrees for about 30-35 minutes. Add more butter as you like when you serve it.
The Queensland blues they don't eat are sold at $1.50 a pound at the Squamish, Pemberton and Kitsilano farmers' markets.
So how happy is Sarah with her "blue" experiment?
"I'm super happy and excited, and can't wait to grow it again because it had the highest yield, it was the ripest and it tastes amazing," she says. "It's a heritage variety and it links me back to my past.
"I'm excited to put it into soil that we'll have prepped a lot better than this year, and hopefully there won't be such a compacted summer, but who knows with global warming. But I think the potential will be amazing."
Glenda Bartosh is an award-winning freelance writer who loves squash.
