Eugenia Bone knows squash blossoms.
The part-time Coloradan taught readers how delicious they could be in “At Mesa’s Edge: Cooking and Ranching in Colorado’s North Fork Valley” and brought more ways to preserve garden flavors to readers in this year’s “Well-Preserved.”
Squash flowers are familiar to Bone. Her chef dad had them in his garden. “He’d plant them in waves so that there were small zucchini and flowers all summer long,” she says.
So: How to pick, when to pick, which to pick and what to do with them?
Last things first.
“You can eat all squash flowers,” Bone says, “but they have varying durability. For a delicate, small squash blossom, the best thing to do is make sauce.”
Squash flower sauce freezes well (see recipe) and can be enjoyed in the middle of winter.
Big, sturdy squash blossoms, like the kind a big Italian zucchini plant pumps out, stand up to battering and frying or stuffing.
For all uses, you’ll want to pick squash blossoms in the early morning or late evening, when the blossoms have closed up. Pick the male flowers. “They’re the flowers on stems that stick straight up like little soldiers,” Bone says.
You only need to leave one good, young male flower — “you want like a rock star,” she says, on the plant to pollinate all the females. Allow one immature young flower to stay on (it will take the rock star’s place in a few days).
Don’t wash the flowers unless they’ve been exposed to pesticides, Bone says. They’re like mushrooms and will become waterlogged. Do peek inside the closed blossoms to check for trapped bugs or bees.
Proceed to stuffing. The French use a pate of cheese and lobster. Bone likes smoked trout. “People should have fun with this. Just use a lighter cheese, like you’d use for a chile relleno.”
Or skip the filling, and just batter, fry and dip them. Bone uses a beer batter, but you can substitute white wine or sake for the beer — or use tempura batter.
The squash flower sauce can be used as a salsa on fish or a sauce for quesadillas.
Zucchini Flower Sauce
This squash flower sauce can be used as a salsa on fish or a sauce for quesadillas. Makes 4 cups.
Ingredients
1 pound zucchini flowers (or other squash blossoms)
3 tablespoons olive oil
1 medium onion, chopped fine (about 1 cup)
4 cups homemade or all-natural low-sodium chicken stock
1 /2
teaspoon saffron threads, soaked in 1 tablespoon warm water for a few minutes
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
Directions
Check insides of the flowers for insects; unless they were sprayed with insecticides, do not wash. Coarsely chop.
Heat the oil in a large skillet over medium heat, about 5 minutes. Add the onion and saute until translucent, about 5 minutes. Add chopped flowers and saute over medium-low heat for about 5 minutes, until the flowers are soft. You will smell their delicious perfume.
Heat the stock to a simmer over low heat. Add the saffron with its water. Pour the saffron-flavored stock over the flowers and simmer gently over low heat for 15 to 20 minutes, until the stock reduces by about a quarter. Add the butter and stir until it melts into the sauce. Do not add salt or pepper unless you are going to serve the sauce immediately.
Spoon the sauce into four 1-cup food-grade freezer containers, leaving 1/2 inch of head space for expansion. Immediately place in the freezer, preferably in the back; the quicker the sauce freezes, the better its texture will be when you defrost it. Defrost in the refrigerator for about 4 hours or place the closed container in a bowl of cool water for about 2 hours.
