Well, laziness sometimes ends up showing you things you would have missed otherwise. I left the butternut squash and little orange field pumpkin sit on the counter all night after halving and removing their seeds for saving. This morning I noticed that the flesh had started to separate a little from the rind of the little orange pumpkin. So in addition to being harder, the rind was also very thick on this one.
Couldn't help but try scraping it out to see if it would make a gourd type bowl. Sure did! I couldn't have done that with the normal type of pumpkin.
So, I put the pretty orange bowl out in the sun to dry and got to thinking about the possibilities this hard rind might have, if I incorporated it into my own pumpkin lines.
Then I wondered if baking would ruin the hardness of the rind, since that's how I typically prepare all of our winter type squashes. Usually I wrap in foil and bake for 1-2 hours, then scoop out the flesh from a floppy collapsing skin. So, I did that to the stem half of the pumpkin.
Wow, that hard shell was super-easy to scoop out after baking! And the heat doesn't seem to have hurt it a bit.
Sadly, the flavor of the flesh was really lacking. It wasn't bad, just had NO sweetness whatsoever. Compared to the butternut that had been stored just as long, this one wasn't even close in quality. The butternut still was great - pleasantly fragrant and sweet.
But even so, I still think there's some potential for this hard rind trait to be added into my hull-less lines maybe, to add another dimension of usefulness to them.
Here are the two halves of the shell put back together. The top (baked) is a little glossier and darker than the bottom. Now let's see how they dry down.
Don't worry, in 20 Yeats you might have a hard rinded, delicious pumpkin strain! :P
ReplyDeleteDon't worry, in 20 Yeats you might have a hard rinded, delicious pumpkin strain! :P
ReplyDeleteI'm betting it wouldn't take that long. I looked it up and the gene for this hard shell is a dominant one, so repeated back crossing with some delicious cultivar could quickly transfer that trait. By the way, I also discovered that this pumpkin is probably a commercial hard-shelled type. I didn't even know they existed, but found out there are quite a few... Iron Man, Lil Ironsides, Cannonball, Rockafellow. I had no idea they were already out there.
ReplyDeleteOh, OK. Still interesting though!
DeleteBTW, they dried down beautifully and still look as good as they did in July. I'm wondering also if the hard rind trait would give any extra protection against disease and/or insects?
ReplyDeleteI would think so. Insects would avoid the fruit for sure
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