“In vain I scowl and pout; / A frown is no extinguisher— / It does not put him out!”

[larryhammer]

A comment in another journal reminded me of a story from my childhood.

My father was a farmer boy, and missed the fresh vegetables he grew up with. Over time, he gradually converted almost half of our backyard into a large garden, if you count the fruit trees. As he cultivated more ground, he got more adventurous. His heirloom watermelons were especially good, though the vines, if not herded, would spread over the entire patio and (remaining) lawn. And then he started growing zucchini, as we call them in the States—some places know them as courgettes. That first year, he decided to start small and plant “only” five hills.

Imma pause a moment to let those who can see where this is going to recover.

For those without experience, here’s the thing: zucchinis are ridonkulously productive. A single plant alone produces several squashes over the summer. And each hill had a half-dozen.

Making this worse: Dad was an organic chemist, and one of his research interests was plant growth factors. (He had a few patents for growth hormones.) Plus he was really into optimizing his compost. He wanted his urban patch to be as productive as possible.

So, yeah, perfect storm. We were swamped with squash. Whelmed, over and under. Huge squash, often longer than 16in / 40cm. Just one stuffed with a tomato-meat sauce was a family meal. And they don’t preserve well. Even Dad got sick of eating them. We were giving the stuff away by the basketful to anyone who would stand still long enough—or in the case of his grad students, forcing them to take as many as they could carry.

By the end of the summer, he admitted that had been a mistake. So the next year, he planted “only” two hills.

It was still too much zucchini. But not as traumatically too too many as that first year.

---L.

Subject quote from My Familiar, John Godfrey Saxe.

Comments

[sartorias]

I remember in the seventies a lot of us cash-strapped hippies thought that garden produce would be very cool. And the word was, the easiest to plant was zucchini... I remember unfondly people trying to force bags and baskets of freshly picked zuchs on us every time we went out. And I don't even like the stuff!

[larryhammer]

Oof.

And yeah, this would have been the late 70s.

[cmcmck]

Although smaller courgettes do pickle well and are yummy!

I'll admit to having a big liking for them!

[larryhammer]

Sliced small ones also fry up nicely. But you have to catch 'em young.

[thistleingrey]

Five hills! That's a lot.

Even here, without enough water and with too much direct sun, I coaxed a zucchini plant into making four or five little ones, a few years ago. (Too much effort versus what one may buy locally, but worth the try.)

[larryhammer]

That's a lot a lot.

[conuly]

And this is why people play ding dong squash all summer long.

[larryhammer]

lmfao

[telophase]

I have vivid memories of using our excess zucchini as target practice where I grew up in the country. Imagine clay pigeons but with zucchini tossed off the back porch and a BB/pellet gun.

There were only three of us and I loathed zucchini. My parents couldn’t eat it fast enough so the things would get big, woody and inedible on the vine, which made them great as targets.

[larryhammer]

lmfao, again

[ranunculus]

I have 2 Cube of Butter plants, which are, kind of, zucchini.... I'd say that roughly I get a squash every second or third day from each plant. Watch out when I'm around, you may find some in your car! The bonus for this variety is that it has much better flavor than anything the 70's ever produced, and it doesn't get woody until it is truly enormous.

[larryhammer]

Cube of butters are pretty good -- we've gotten them in farm-shares.

[janni]

Zucchini summer. ❤️

[larryhammer]

VERY zucchini summer. 🤢 🤮

[marjorie1170]

lol. I like zucchini but too much is too much. I get a kick out of the zucchini memes that appear late summer. "Take care. It's that time of year when you must lock your doors…or people will put zucchini in your car."

[larryhammer]

Too much is waaaaaaaay too much.

[sovay]

That first year, he decided to start small and plant “only” five hills.

I'm having flashbacks to my childhood library copy of Jim Flora's The Great Green Turkey Creek Monster (1976).

(When I was in high school, the neighbors across the street used to grow zucchini. There was always too much zucchini. I'm not sure it's actually possible to grow less than too much zucchini. As soon as you plant it, I think it's too much.)

[larryhammer]

As soon as you plant it, I think it's too much.

That's how my trauma processes it.

[umadoshi]

After my grandmother died (early-mid '80s), my grandfather took up gardening. He grew zucchini. If my memory from so long ago (and when I was pretty young) is right, he grew zucchini once. The aunt who was in and out of his place a lot helping him with things after Granny died had to deal with so much zucchini. I feel like the entire family had zucchini loaves in the freezer for years following, due to the sheer quantity.

[larryhammer]

That totally tracks.