Squash Flower / Zuccinibluete
This year I got no One Balls but the oblong Soleil. Actually taste better and are preferable to handle portions, but blossoms look just the same. This is a shot from still before the Hailstorm when there where still 4 plants growing almost to profusely. / Dieses Jahr bauten wir keine One Balls sondern laengliche Soleil an. Die schmecken tatsaechlich zarter und sind einfacher zum portionieren. Vor dem Hagelschlag hatte ich 4 Pflanzen, die zu viel Fruechte fuer unseren Frischbedarf trugen. |
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10 comments so far...
The Soleil Summer Squash got nice blossoms that are fairly huge for a Zuccini but nicely tender and pointy. It is extra noted at some descriptions on the seed packages that they are rather neutral tasting and good looking eatables, great for decorating the salad platter just gently washed after collecting or to fry up dipped in liquid batter for use in a showy first course or desert, or clever vessel for condiment servings.
I never tried as my cooking style is not that hoity-toity, it is just as my husband and me realized that as we prefer juicy cubes in fast stir fries and pasta toppings over filled whole fruit from the oven in summer and spare the extra heat in the kitchen, buying an enlongated yellow squash that develops flavour earlier and seeds in pulp later seemed suddenly a bright idea, and we where not disapointed.
I posted a picture of a Zucchini blossom fairly recently, and if you compare the two, there are actually subtle differences in the shape and color pattern of their flowers, too. If you compare the plants' leaves in your photo and mine, you can see clear differences... Definitely not the same plant! Although, I will say that in terms of cuisine, there are basically interchangeable -- with a few exceptions....
https://www.edeka.de/rezepte-ernaehrung/expertenwissen/1000-fragen-1000-antworten/worin-unterscheiden-sich-gruene-und-gelbe-zucchini.jsp
Of course there are subtle differences, but those you can even have in two plants from the same bag. I once was silly enough to safe seeds from the One Balls instead of buying new seeds for spring at the store and I can tell you, what I did grow that year was mostly below average tasting to inpalatabe and each distinctly different in looks as the plants from the deco mini-pumkin sortiment. So far to saving seeds from an F1 hybrid.
There you see second-year One Balls: http://www.ipernity.com/doc/303247/27787957/in/album/552313
And for comparison a seed pack's presentation (my first year crop looked always like that as well)
https://www.samenhaus.de/zucchinisamen-zuccini-one-ball-f1-hybride-von-sperli-samen/a-575/
But anyway..... Debate aside.... A nice capture ;)
A zuccini is always a squash, but not all squashes are zuccinis, Usually a Zuccini is a C.pepo only Korean Zucchini is a C. moschata, while some in that species are allready called a pumpkin. Yellow oblong zuccinis where always called "summer squash" where we bought them in the USA in the grocery department, which was usually at Meijers or Farmer Jack's in MI. It seems that "summer squash" is alternately or also used for very young harvested and smal Pattison Squashes, although I have to say I hardly ever saw a Pattison at a store outside Halloween decoration selling time, and then that where sizeable flying saucer of the little green men, with rather hard waxy peel. I never tried such a odd looking thing.
Zucchinis were always fun to watch grow to their true proportions --- grandma had quite a few specimens topping 6ft. in length. They basically started harvesting once the things reached 2-3ft. in length and then just picked 'em as necessary or to have varying sizes for cooking --- the flavor changed as the Zucchini matured/grew. Other squashes were less time-consuming.... Harvest 'em at the peak of ripeness for best nutritional value for the animals and store 'em. Fun stuff =)
When it comes to eating especially healthy, consider to grow stabile sorts of vegetables, resistant to mildew without any treatments ever, not pretty trend fruits for show.
I dont know actually why we started to grow a yellow ball summer squash first, likely for vanity as you cant buy any look-alikes at the discounter and tangerine-style segments as sweet and sour preserve are just so exotic looking and stick out. They have no real very special properties asides of form, colour and decoration value in the end, and there are just as fine and buttery tasting oblong fruit with a nicer yield and tougher leafs.