It is courgette weather.
The combination of high rainfall, balmy temperatures and the occasional burst of fierce sunshine is producing almost tropical levels of growth in the veg patch - and out-pacing them all are the courgettes and squash, now at near-Biblical levels of greenery.
It is so important to pick over your courgette plants at least twice a week when they are in full production like this. You catch them at their ideal size (15cm long or diameter, depending on which kind you’re growing): and you make sure they stay productive.
As soon as the fruits grow over-large, to the point where they begin developing seeds, the plants think their job is done and stop producing more. Right now, when your kitchen is disappearing under a tsunami of courgettes, that might feel like a blessing. But in a few weeks when you might still be picking and enjoying delicately flavoured, fresh-picked courgettes if only you hadn’t let them stop, you’ll be sorry.
Annoyingly, courgettes don’t freeze well. The trick to preserving your glut, then, is to cook it into dishes that do: pasta sauces, ratatouilles, courgette mousse, and of course soup - vast quantities of soup.
This is my go-to recipe for a no-fuss, straightforward courgette soup that uses up loads of courgettes, takes hardly any time to whizz up and can be made almost entirely from ingredients harvested from your garden right now. Enjoy!
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