My first Experience Growing and Cooking Pattypan Squash

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    So far, this spring garden has been one of my most enjoyable, successful and experimental gardening seasons I've ever had.  It has brought me so much joy and I've learned so much from my tiny urban garden.  
      Because I decided to try growing from seeds this year, instead of buying transplants, one of the things that I've discovered is a new seed company online,  it is called Seeds Now.  I love perusing all of the seeds that they have available and finding some that I would love to give a try.  That's what happened when I saw the cute picture of a Pattypan Squash!  I mean, look at that thing, isn't it cute?  I could decorate tables with them! I fell in love with the look of the pattypan and decided to order some seeds to give them a try in my 3 sisters garden.  I thought you might like to hear all about this journey! 

My 3 Sisters Garden contains Popcorn, Pattypan Squash, Pumpkin, and beans.

     Back in April, I told you about my 3 Sisters Garden experiment.  It included planting corn, beans and squash.  Fortunately, or Unfortunately, depending on how you look at it, I had a lot of volunteer pumpkins come up.  But, since they are a squash, I let some of them stay.  Squash plants look quite a bit alike, so I was afraid that I would pull out a pattypan instead of a pumpkin.  Soon I started seeing baby pumpkins setting, but no pattypan.  I was disappointed, but then one day, looking through all of those prickly leaves, I spied a white pattypan squash!  It is pretty amazing how happy that little white squash made me!  
     The squash was white, so I thought that it wasn't ripe, because I was expecting it to be yellow.  Online research let me know that pattypans come in a variety of colors and mine happened to be the white variety and that I should have harvested that squash when it was smaller.  Oh, well, live and learn. 

Pattypan Squash

Here it is cut in half. Lots of seeds to save!

     I've learned that if you harvest the pattypan earlier, the skin will be more tender for eating.  One funny thing I saw, after harvesting my squash, was at an Asian Grocery Store.  There was a jar of tiny, maybe 2 inch white pattypan squash pickled and canned in a jar!   I don't think that I want to try that, but it is an option if you want to do it! 

     Instead of pickling, I pan roasted our squash.  Pattypan Squash is slightly firmer, but has much the same flavor as Zucchini Squash.  So, it doesn't take too long to cook and all you need to season it with is a little garlic powder, salt and pepper.  Pan roasting it gives it a great flavor.  
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To prepare it, I removed the seeds and sliced it into these curvy slices. If your squash is a big as mine, about 5-6 inches across, you may want to remove the skin as it will be tough. I didn't remove the skin and we just ate the squash out of it.

I coated a cast iron skillet with a couple of Tablespoons of Olive Oil and laid the slices on their sides in the pan. I seasoned them on each side with salt, pepper and garlic powder. When one side was brown i flipped them over with tongs to the other side. I used a fork to pierce them to see if the squash was tender enough to eat.

The squash made a delicious addition to our dinner that night!

     I kept looking for more squash after that first one to no avail.  I was certain that there had been too much cross pollination or something with the pumpkins.  Then one day my son was here and he looked out at my garden and came in and told me that he had seen another one!  This one is smaller, so I may chop it up to pan roast it.  Then, today I was poking around in the 3 Sister's Garden and I saw another tiny one growing! So, maybe they are just taking off, idk.  Fingers crossed! 

     I didn't make a recipe for the way I cooked these squash because it is such a simple preparation that I think anyone can follow the steps above.  
     Since I was only feeding my husband and myself that day, I only cooked up half of the pattypan for our meal.  A couple of days later, I peeled and chopped up the other half and put it into an Italian style one pan meal that we like to eat around here.  It replaced the zucchini that I usually use.  That was a satisfying meal that night because I used the squash, onions, peppers, tomatoes and basil all from my garden in it.  What a great feeling to be growing a lot of my family's food! 
      If you have any experience with Pattypan Squash and have a recipe to share with me, I would love to hear it!  Hopefully I will be needing it!  Thanks! 
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