Upo
Upo: Lagenaria Siceraria, also known as bottle gourd, is a popular vegetable originating in Asia and is the only thing known to be more prolific than zucchini. It's green skin and white flesh is used in many Filipino dishes for the first week of production. After that, growers are generally overwhelmed by the sheer volumes it produces and resort to dumping it off at the doorsteps of unsuspecting Asian families just to get rid of it. Growers must exercise caution and stay in motion when around producing upo plants or risk being covered in vines and desiccated in the plants efforts to produce even more fruits.
Besides asparagus and potatoes, the other overwhelming success in our garden this year has been upo which I made up a definition for above. I have literally never seen anything like it and I have grown zucchini before! The vines started off very slow in the cold west spring we had and even into mid summer they hadn't produced a single fruit. But in the last few weeks of summer and the first week of fall, it is like they are making up for lost time. Each week, we pick about what you see below in the two baskets and the pile between them. Just one of those is enough for a couple meals in our family so there is no possible way we can consume it all. Filipinos cube it up and sauté it in a wok in various dishes but I'm not sure of a way to preserve it beyond that. Canning it would turn it to mush and I don't think they would use it if I dry it. Freezing is out as we already have a freezer full of other things.
So we started out by selling it at a local Asian grocery store which worked but word got out and soon we were giving it away to Asians in a ten country region in SE Iowa. Even that wasn't enough to get rid of it all and it has been piling up in our pantry. With today's picking below, I probably have about five baskets brimming full of the stuff. I think my wife is going to take it all back to the Asian grocery store and see if they will pay us a pittance just to get it out of our house before an avalanche in our pantry buries someone alive.
On a serious note, our arched trellis made of steel fence posts and metal hog panels has been such a success, I'm thinking that next year we should build another one or expand this one. Another project to add to my never shrinking list!
Goodness! The arch looks good though.
ReplyDeleteThank you!
DeleteWell Ed, it certainly looks like you had a bumper crop of the stuff and I just learned something new today. I'd be interested in seeing this cooked!
ReplyDeleteAs it turned out, this was about a third of what we harvested the following week! I am amazed by the stuff. Cooked, it looks similar to eggplant with a translucent sort of look and really doesn't have a lot of flavor on its own but readily absorbs flavors of whatever it is being cooked with.
DeleteLove the definition you wrote! I think Kudzu might grow on you if you stay still too long, as well.
ReplyDeleteOnce you complete your second trellis, you can come down and build me one. :D (we don't have your winters, so anytime would work)
I've seen countrysides overwhelmed by kudzu. I wouldn't wish that on anybody!
DeleteIt sounds like it easily gets away from growers. The story at the top reminded me of what we say about zucchini here. I love the stuff but people grow it too big(for my tastes) and then want to give away an enormous amount. Hope you can find a use for it!
ReplyDeleteThis is similar in that most of it is two or three times the size of what we pick it at. Everyone prizes the smaller ones and so we've been told they fly off the shelves at the local asian store.
DeleteSounds like the Asian counterpart to zucchini!
ReplyDeleteOnly more prolific!
DeleteCongratulations on the birth of your upos. So fertile!
ReplyDeleteAt this point, I'm wondering what it might take to stop proliferation before it is too late!
DeleteOh, I love those squash/gourds! I skin and seed them and simmer with chicken. But you are right - just one will do and you have tons!
ReplyDeleteI have eaten plenty of them thus far simmered with a variety of stuff but thankfully, we've given away and sold all that we couldn't eat.
DeleteThe arch looks awesome, Ed. Congrats on your upo bounty. I learned so much from visiting you today. I need to research this and see if it would make a tasty treat for our pet rabbits. I want to grow something for them and this might be it. Thanks.
ReplyDeleteI don't know how many rabbits you keep but if you do plant some of these, you might need more rabbits!
DeleteEd, I thought Zucchini were the scourge of the over-productive gourd plant. I stand corrected.
ReplyDeleteCongratulations on the trellis!
I am now wiser in that aspect as well.
DeleteMy zucchini was incredible this year. I like them saute when young, but the ball bat size ones are great as fillers in bread and cookies, in lasagna or spiraled as noodles. I think we froze 30 packets, in addition to giving zucchini to anyone wanting some.
ReplyDeleteWe didn't plant any zucchini because the filipino side of my family doesn't really cook with them. Plus, I generally can get all the zucchini I need for the above mentioned things from other people's excess.
DeleteNice trellis!
ReplyDeleteWow! I am totally impressed. Your upo looks like what the Japanese call hyotan. I've never seen mom prepare it though.
ReplyDeleteI have never even heard of Upo. I was going to suggest freezing, until you said your freezer is full. Maybe you need another freezer! (But even then, how much Upo can you reasonably be expected to consume?!)
ReplyDelete