Thursday, October 17, 2013

Cucamelons



I love to garden!  The feeling of the rich warm dirt in my hands just makes me so happy. When I started to plan our garden this year I researched GMO and decided this year we would try to grow as much organic as possible.  We planted lots of the standard garden veggies, tomatoes, zucchini, cucumber, carrots, brussel sprouts, some herbs and a new exotic fruit, the CUCAMELON!!  You may ask what is a cucamelon.  Well it is found in Mexico and South America.  I saw a picture of this cute fruit that resembled a mini watermelon and had to try it.  I ordered the seeds and waited patiently for them to arrive.  About 3 days later the seeds arrived.  I planted them in our mini greenhouse and again patiently waited.  Nothing happened.....until about 2 weeks of PATIENCE, and little green sprouts started to grow.  This plant was so fun to watch but again I had to be patient.  Can you tell it took a lot of patience for me to grow this plant!  I guess I expected it to grow overnight!!

After what seemed like forever I was able to transplant these cute vines (about 12 of them) into a large whiskey barrel.  We put in a trellis so my new plants would have something to climb.  I have to admit it did take some time before we saw any blossoms but when it did, the tiny yellow flowers were just adorable!  Then a few weeks later we had tiny "watermelons" hanging on the vine.  The taste was so different and fun.  Tart, crisp, and the flavor of cucumber.  We loved them.  I didn't make a dish out of them we would just pick and pop them in out mouths.  The kids were over on day and we would take a cucamelon, some fresh basil and cherry tomatoes and make a caprice snack.  YUMMY!!

We are planning to grow them again next summer!!

They are like tiny little "watermelons".
                                                          The vine looks like ivy.
The seeds are large but not hard, totally edible and delicious!!

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