The Zucchini That Ate Manhattan

Excerpt from Grow Great Grub by Gayla Trail:

"Once or twice per season, a zucchini is lost in the tangle of leaves or just plain forgotten and I get stuck with the squash that ate Manhattan..."

Since I read through each part of Gayla's book at least 3 times before the growing season even began, I had fair warning about such zucchinis and I made a vow to myself that retrospectively sounds like the one my mother made before she had born a child: "My children WILL NOT suck their thumbs!"  I will leave it as a mystery as to which of her children did, but only tell you, it was not me.

Yes, folks, I vowed to not have THAT zucchini.  I would check my garden diligently and harvest my squashes at appropriate sizes.

Seriously, this had to be the first squash to sprout:

That is Tim's foot not mine.

The zucchini I am referring to is the one that looks like Goliath in Veggie Tales.  In fact, it just may be Goliath.

Sigh.  We harvested it two weeks ago, and I still have not used it.  We have used the other zucchinis in various other capacities, but not that one.  Luckily, the above quotation was next to a recipe Gayla designed for just such a monstrosity.

"A vegetable so hard, dry, and wooden does not seem fit to eat, yet the thought of throwing it into the bin seems just plain wrong.  In the quest to make the inedible delicious, this recipe was born."

I will let you buy the book to get the recipe.

In other gardening news, my cilantro was taking over and shading my peppers, so I pulled most of it up, and still had plenty left.  I had planted a ton of seeds, because at the time nothing seemed to be growing so I thought I would put in plenty to increase the chances of success.  As we have already discussed, it's God who grows things and as you may or may not have learned yet in life, God has a definite sense of humor.

The tomatoes are producing fruit, I am just now waiting oh-so-impatiently for them to turn.  God takes care of that part to....and He helps US grow by teaching us patience.  Hmph.

Also, here is a picture of my jalapenos.  This picture was totally a God thing, because I just held the camera down there and clicked the button and had no idea what I was actually aiming at.  Not surprising, God has great aim and focus, and gave me this good picture!

In other gardening news, I pruned my roses.  They were getting black spot something fierce.  They seem to be healthier and happier now.

So that's it for the garden update for now.  I hope all of your gardens are coming along swimmingly.