Hey folks,
I cooked up three maxima squash of the same shape, different sources, different times of year. Cinderella Pumpkin shape, two were pink and one was red. The first one (pink) was sweet, and the other two weren’t. Don’t know the exact variety of each one, and maybe this is a dumb question, but have you noticed the flavor of your winter squash changing with storage time? Wondering if the later ones lost their sweetness over the winter months. I’ve noticed small squash can do this, with drying out etc. but wouldn’t you think that as a fruit ripens it would become sweeter?
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Maximizing Yield and Eating Quality in Winter Squash 11 (1) (1).pdf (20.7 KB)
Already mentioned a couple times there: a good document summing it up: starch / sugar / water contents, and relative balance of those elements over time in storage…
So it’s a little more complicated that “improving in storage or not” because, for many squash (moschata notably), the maximum starch is at harvest, and then this starch is turned into sugars progressively in storage, sugar peaks by then, making taste better, and eventually gets depleted, and taste goes wrong accordingly, little before total collapse of the fruit.
So tastewise it’s more like peaking then falling. Can take months for some sorts to peak (most moschatas - but not those used for canning for ex, bred only for yield, i.e. high water content and low starch), and for others (most pepos for ex, some maximas) peak is around harvest.
You got another recap of that on Johnny’s: Why Some Winter Squash Varieties Just Taste Better | Johnny's Selected Seeds
In my experience it’s confirmed:
Eat pepo first, don’t wait too much for maximas, and then enjoy moschatas later in season.
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Thanks for the links. I do however observe a great deal of variation even within a single species. Take moschata for example. Some are more orange-y inside than others that are closer to yellow. Some are wet inside; some dry. Some are starchier while others are fruitier. I have encountered moschatas that smell almost like a ripe cantaloupe when opened. My favorites are those that are very orange-y and fruity-smelling. They tend to be sweeter as well, although I’m somewhat indifferent to sweetness. Sweetness can become too much of a good thing in my opinion. I remember one that was just too sweet for the main course. It would have been great for dessert though. Maybe with whipped cream and chocolate sauce. But since i didn’t prepare it as a dessert, i was put off by its excessive sweetness.
Yes, got it - we all have different taste buds -, but still relevant : trends in contents over time and before collapse of the fruit are valid.
For the rest it’s all about for what it’s been bred for.
My personal taste goes to both fruity and sweet, combined. To the point that seeds of my very best moschatas smell fruity a year after drying them.
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My favourite squash is Sibley, a maxima. Still delicious after a year.
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Trying Sibley this year! So far doing good!
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What I wrote there is quite relative to context : I get that others have a different rule of thumb with longer storing and better maximas - in general linked to higher soil fertility. It never happened in my low ph soil with little irrigation, where moschata show there abilities to thrive in low fertility. There, yield and fruit qualities, as much as plant health, seem to go accordingly to those capacities.
But yes context is key.
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