Ya Want The Good News Or The Bad News First?

Aw heck, I'll give ya the bad first and get it out of the way.

Because of our warmer than usual growing season, my Red Kuri squash have been lookin' pretty darn good. But now that we have plummeted into our fall temps and the days are wonderfully cool and crisp, I've been afraid the squash wouldn't be able to make it that last step toward ripe maturity.

Today I decided to cut one open to see how it looked. I picked the smallest one I could find, brought it in and opened it up.

Rats. Still a good ways from ripe. When ripe the flesh should look almost orange, like it does way out toward the rind at the edge of this squash.

Then I got to thinking that since I chose a very small squash for testing, wouldn't that mean it was a "young" squash and hadn't had as much time to grow as one of the larger ones?

Back out into the garden to harvest a good-sized one. Alas and alack, it looked just the same inside as the first little one. Sad to say, I just don't think they will have enough time and/or warm weather to make it (again!) this year. (Where's that large hoop greenhouse when I need it?)

Okay, forget the squash. On to the good news.

I planted two rows of red potatoes and two rows of white potatoes this year. The vines have been dead and shriveled for a while now but I haven't gone out to the patch to sneak even one potato until today. I was fixing dinner and wanted to make mashed potatoes with gravy to go with Swiss Steak so asked hubby to grab a spading fork and bucket and follow me out to the garden. If the potato harvest was going to be anything like last year's pitiful offering, we would have to dig a bit for even enough for our meal today.

Holy spuds, Batman! This was just from the very first plant we dug up. Six pounds and one ounce of beautiful, firm potatoes. The big one in front weighed in at one pound by itself.

If this is indicative of what the rest of the harvest will be like, we will have more than enough potatoes to eat and share this winter.

So let's look at it this way: If you had to choose one . . . potatoes or squash . . . of which would you rather have an ample supply? Yup, I'd take potatoes every time, and be very grateful.