Invasion of the Squash

My middle daughter planted a garden this past spring at her home in Wisconsin. I was pleased. I tend to put out a few tomatoes and peppers each year. This year I planted a few cantaloupes as well, but between my aversion to cicadas, the weird weather patterns, and rabbits, my garden will likely yield very little. 

Perhaps I’ll harvest a single grape tomato for a single salad. 

 

I digress. This is about my daughter’s garden. This is the child I worried would grow up, marry, and take her family to McDonald’s for Thanksgiving. Now, here she is, a mother of four planting a garden and cooking delicious foods for her husband and kiddos.

 

She has canned produce, frozen veggies she raised, and even made bread and butter pickles. 

And she shares.

A few of the smaller squash awaiting processing.

Along with the other vegetables, Danielle planted three yellow squash plants and three zucchini plants. Her yield? More than she could manage. She cooked, baked, and froze squash. She gave produce to friends and family. They continued to grow. And grow.

 

The vegetables grew until they reached the size of small torpedoes. 

 

On a recent visit, Danielle brought several of the monsters to us, her Ohio family. My mother took a couple of them home to cook. My other two daughters took veggies as well. Fried, baked, cubed for soup, and shredded for breads and quiche, we have managed to make good use of the squash, freezing what we can’t use immediately.

 

We seem to all have the invasion of veggies under control now. I trust, this winter, when I bake a lemon-yellow squash dessert or zucchini bread or when I add a touch of summer’s garden to a nourishing vegetable soup or chili, I will remember not only the gift from God for the food, but also the gift of the sweet little gardener in my life. My daughter.