This year at Zion Mountain Ranch in Utah, we were very late with our planting. In fact, you guys in southwest Mississippi were probably harvesting squash before ours were even in the ground.
We didn’t get to plant squash until May, but when we did get to plant, we put a lot in.
Somewhere I read that if you are growing squash for a family, you should plant one vine per person — but this was intended for a farm-to-table restaurant ,so we planted a total of five 80-foot rows of yellow crookneck, yellow and green scallops (my favorites for frying), golden zucchini as well as green ones — not to mention several varieties of winter squash.
Our garden has been burying our kitchen in squash since the first row started producing, and now we have three more rows beginning to produce.
Summer squash is so prolific that you really have to work to find ways to use it all. Fortunately squash is very versatile. You can use it in soups, salads or pickles. It can be stewed, grilled, sauteed or breaded and fried. You can even use it to make zucchini bread (similar to carrot cake) or squash pie (similar to pumpkin pie but more lemony).
I’m going to stop there because I’m starting to sound like Bubba Gump talking about all the things you can do with shrimp.
One of my smart-alek brothers once made a comment about some zucchini bread that he didn’t care for, “Now I know how Jesus fed thousands of people with a loaf of bread — it must have been zucchini bread!”
Another thing my mom used to do with summer squash was a zucchini casserole that was actually one of my summer favorites. I’ve tried for years to recreate Wylene’s zucchini casserole, but none of the recipes I’ve tried have ever been quite right. Most of them are rice-based and hers wasn’t. Most of them are a bit bland, but hers was full of flavor.
Imagine my surprise after drowning the Zion Mountain Ranch kitchen in summer squash when the chef came out with a zucchini casserole that was very much like I remember Mom’s being.
He cut the green and yellow squashes into half-inch wide half-rounds and sauteed them with white or yellow onion till they were about half-done. Then he cooled them and mixed them with egg, cheddar cheese and heavy cream (like in a lasagna) and topped them with panko (Mom would have used cracker crumbs) and more cheddar before baking the casserole.
The result was very good and the closest to what I remember of Wylene’s recipe of any casseroles that I’ve seen. The only thing that I think she would add to the chef’s recipe was a pound of spicy pork sausage browned and drained, and maybe a dash or two of Tony’s.
I’m totally going to have to try this new recipe during the Thanksgiving season this year.
Incidentally, Mom would occasionally substitute broccoli and cauliflower for the squash, or chicken breasts for the pork sausage, and the resulting variation was always a big winner, too.
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Patrick Parker
www.roamingparkers.com for Travel, Adventure, Conservation, and Food!
