For some, using the big yellow-orange squash and pumpkin flowers for food seems a bit strange, but there are long and varied culinary traditions surrounding the squash blossom. The taste is so subtle that it lends itself to many, many delicious ways of preparing this wonderful flower.
Squash and pumpkins can do quite well in Reno, too, and one or two plants can be enough to provide plenty of flowers for delicious meals.
Whether Italian, Mexican, Thai or simply experimental, there are a thousand ways to prepare summer squash blossom treats:
- Put them on Pizza hot out of the oven.
- Put them on Quesadillas on top of melted white chedder.
- Grill them lightly, then serve them with corn on the cob sprinkled with a little cumin.
- Batter them and fry them like the Italians love to do.
- Put them in salads with a nice fat free sweet fig dressing.
- Coat them with flour, pan fry and serve with your favorite hot pepper sauce.
- Batter them, fry them and serve them with spicy fish sauce and white rice.
Even if you didn't have room in your garden for a squash plant, next year you can easily grow one in a pot on your patio. That way you'll have plenty of squash blossoms to experiment with.