Courgettes grow the way I imagine triffids would; big, strong and dominant. The one tip I can give right away is to read the instructions on the back of the seed packet. This sounds obvious I know but I’ve had a lot of courgette-based conversations recently and they took all my friends by surprise.
Last year, we moved into a new house with a lovely sized garden and we were very enthusiastic and wanted to grow everything. I spent some time researching which vegetables grew best in England and courgettes kept coming up. We like courgettes, so we decided to give it a go. I started with my seeds in trays inside and thought that if some of my ten seeds grew, I would be happy. Well they all grew. When they got bigger, I moved them outside and thought if a few survived, I would be happy.
Firstly, they did not like being outside. The leaves all turned white which I learnt meant that they were sunburnt – they were more sensitive than I thought to the English sun. I hadn’t acclimatised them properly, because this is England and it was early in the year and it mostly rained.
Anyway, they soldiered on and as it grew warmer, they just took over (like triffids). They had huge leaves, and every time I looked at them, it felt like they were doubling. I could barely see the courgettes under the canopy of leaves. I should point out here that even though I knew they grew well, I didn’t know how well, and I planted them a little too closely together and the umbrella of leaves meant that I could not see what was happening below, which was courgettes growing bigger than my forearms.
The courgettes themselves grow fast. In just a few weeks they grew from a few centimetres to a hefty 12 inches. I thought that because I spaced them so closely, I would only get mini courgettes, but they were massive. One important point about courgettes is that they need pollination to succeed. You start with male flowers but need female flowers and the only way to do this is with helpful insects that help the pollination process. Make sure that your garden has pollination-friendly flowers too to encourage bees and other creatures.
The moral of this story is to be positive. I shouldn’t have expected just a few to grow and them to be small. I should have believed that they would all grow and be amazing to eat. So, this year’s courgette patch is a little better spaced out and I have a list of recipes already in my mind because I expect there to be dozens and dozens this summer.
Courgettes are so easy to cook and versatile enough for all types of cuisine. Throw them on the grill, pickle them, mix them into a curry, make a ratatouille – the possibilities are endless. This year, I want to try some new cooking techniques with my courgettes and learn more about how to preserve them. These are what’s taken my fancy so far – they are not my recipes or ideas, just interesting things I’ve found online, full credit to those who created them.
Courgette martini, BBC Good Food, https://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/courgette-martini
Courgette and cheese soufflé, delicious magazine http://www.deliciousmagazine.co.uk/recipes/courgette-and-berkswell-cheese-souffle/
Pickled courgettes, allrecipes, http://allrecipes.co.uk/recipe/26654/pickled-courgette.aspx
Courgette cake, Good Housekeeping http://www.goodhousekeeping.co.uk/food/recipes/courgette-cake
Courgette pate, mumsnet https://www.mumsnet.com/food/recipe/1778-Creamy-courgette-pate
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