Tiny melons with tiny flavor
Note: This entry was postdated.
One of the fruits my father was most excited to grow this year was watermelon. He loves melon, and he really looked forward to having a bunch of melons in our garden patch. He grew them from seed, transferring a number of seedlings to the ground, where most of them promptly died. The rest struggled. When they'd appear to bear fruit, it wouldn't last long for whatever reason; dad thought the critters were getting to them. Weeks, months passed; no melon.
Finally, he got himself a melon, and he was terribly excited about it. Almost every day he would give an update on it, and it wasn't long before we could even see it from the house. Melon! We have a melon!
Dad was going to let it keep going until the first frost, but he noticed it wasn't really growing any more; perhaps it's time to just pick it and get it over with. I took pictures of it this afternoon; it's about the size of a softball. It's bigger than my hand, but just barely; I definitely didn't need two hands to hold it, though it helps. I made sure to get the pictures because I joked about having it for dessert tonight, and sure enough that's what dad did.
He called me down to take pictures, but I was in the middle of something and he had to wait for me. Sorry. But we were all there for the big reveal, when he sliced it open and we found...a nearly white center. Oh. It looked almost yellow in the light. There were fragments of pale pink inside, but definitely not the red we were expecting. We were hoping it was just, I don't know, a personal variety meant to be grown smaller. Alas, it should have been much, much bigger, and perhaps had we left it it might have gotten more color inside, but considering it's October, it wouldn't have been long for this world.
Mom and I still wanted to taste it, just in case. Dad went first and didn't like it. I tried a piece with a fair amount of pink to it; there was a hint of melon flavor, not bad. Mom thought it reminded her of a cucumber, and actually asked if it *was* a cucumber. Um, no. It definitely smelled like melon when he cut it open, at least. Well, we tried; I'm not sure what we could do differently next year for a different outcome.
Our garden as a whole did not live up to expectations in a lot of ways this year, probably a direct result of my not being around to take care of it like I have been in recent years. It wasn't a total bust, at least; our cherry tomatoes did pretty well, and our peppers were the best ever (who knew they preferred being neglected?). The lettuce was actually overwhelming and I don't think we'll plant that much of it in the future, though I wish I'd been home to make more salads with it. It has now gone to seed and dad's saying we shouldn't eat it any longer. But our best edible item was our strawberry plant. It's awesome. It's produced from the get-go, as soon as it had enough leaves, and it's still producing. I'll never regret getting it.
One of the fruits my father was most excited to grow this year was watermelon. He loves melon, and he really looked forward to having a bunch of melons in our garden patch. He grew them from seed, transferring a number of seedlings to the ground, where most of them promptly died. The rest struggled. When they'd appear to bear fruit, it wouldn't last long for whatever reason; dad thought the critters were getting to them. Weeks, months passed; no melon.
Finally, he got himself a melon, and he was terribly excited about it. Almost every day he would give an update on it, and it wasn't long before we could even see it from the house. Melon! We have a melon!
Dad was going to let it keep going until the first frost, but he noticed it wasn't really growing any more; perhaps it's time to just pick it and get it over with. I took pictures of it this afternoon; it's about the size of a softball. It's bigger than my hand, but just barely; I definitely didn't need two hands to hold it, though it helps. I made sure to get the pictures because I joked about having it for dessert tonight, and sure enough that's what dad did.
He called me down to take pictures, but I was in the middle of something and he had to wait for me. Sorry. But we were all there for the big reveal, when he sliced it open and we found...a nearly white center. Oh. It looked almost yellow in the light. There were fragments of pale pink inside, but definitely not the red we were expecting. We were hoping it was just, I don't know, a personal variety meant to be grown smaller. Alas, it should have been much, much bigger, and perhaps had we left it it might have gotten more color inside, but considering it's October, it wouldn't have been long for this world.
Mom and I still wanted to taste it, just in case. Dad went first and didn't like it. I tried a piece with a fair amount of pink to it; there was a hint of melon flavor, not bad. Mom thought it reminded her of a cucumber, and actually asked if it *was* a cucumber. Um, no. It definitely smelled like melon when he cut it open, at least. Well, we tried; I'm not sure what we could do differently next year for a different outcome.
Our garden as a whole did not live up to expectations in a lot of ways this year, probably a direct result of my not being around to take care of it like I have been in recent years. It wasn't a total bust, at least; our cherry tomatoes did pretty well, and our peppers were the best ever (who knew they preferred being neglected?). The lettuce was actually overwhelming and I don't think we'll plant that much of it in the future, though I wish I'd been home to make more salads with it. It has now gone to seed and dad's saying we shouldn't eat it any longer. But our best edible item was our strawberry plant. It's awesome. It's produced from the get-go, as soon as it had enough leaves, and it's still producing. I'll never regret getting it.