fresh squash blossom sightings?

Has anyone spotted these morsels?

Cheers,
Wade

in my backyard, but i don't know what to do with them. any tips? the zucchini hasn't actually started growing yet, and i thought that you should wait and pick it off the grown fruit to prepare it - is this correct?

I've been buying them at the local farmers' market for a few weeks. I've been making a puree of sauteed baby leeks and goat cheese. I then stuff them with the puree, dip them in tempura batter and deep fry quickly.

Bill/SFNM

milic13 wrote:in my backyard, but i don't know what to do with them. any tips? the zucchini hasn't actually started growing yet, and i thought that you should wait and pick it off the grown fruit to prepare it - is this correct?

I too have a bumber crop, including two today which were the largest I've ever seen. I'll post on them (with pics) when time permits, as well as on some of the things I've been cooking with them for the past month or so. I'll add the new posts to the following thread I started last year, which includes a number of suggestions for preparing them:
Marrow Blooms: sciurë 'e cucuzziellë/flours de cougourdeto
http://lthforum.com/bb/viewtopic.php?p=36890#36890

Antonius

I just saw some yesterday at the Green City Market - Lincon Park. Can't remember how much they were running, though.

--gtgirl

gtgirl wrote:I just saw some yesterday at the Green City Market - Lincon Park. Can't remember how much they were running, though.

--gtgirl

Nicholl's was selling small zuchini with the blossoms attached. I thought about it, but each box only had about 3 or 4 blossoms.

To digress slightly, the market yesterday was awesome. I see this period as the peak of the first wave of marketing. The earliest crops were still left, still looking good, Michigan asparagus, the last strawberries and rhubarb; those that followed were colorful and abundant, all the varieties of peas, favas, beets and turnips and kohlrabi like the rainbow. Even as the earliest stuff was at its pinacle, new troops were rushing in. Cherries, and berries blue and rasp were plentiful, onions were getting bigger and potatoes are starting to show up.

Beyond that, yesterday's Green City had ample offerings of local meats and eggs, Seedlings delicious fruit butters, and some pretty special cheeses. Sure, sure, I lucked into a great parking spot and ran into proto-LTHer Thor, but if you have not been to a farmer's market yet, this is a good week to start.

Cucurbits normally have both male and female blossoms with pollination done by insects. Male blossoms normally show up before the first female blossom, which probably explains milic13's observation. Male blossoms have a straight stem while female blossoms have the beginnings of the fruit as the stem. Squash blossoms sold by themselves are normally male. Zucchini often have a large embryonic fruit and may be useful as baby zucchini even if they are not pollinated.