Why a Bushel of Winter Squash is the Best Thing You Can Buy this Fall

What's the best thing you can do during Fall in the Midwest?

Buy a bushel of squash of course.

Pumpkin patches are all the rage, but almost all of these carefully selected cucurbits are destined for a life of no more significance than joining up with some mums to decorate a porch. Families will visit working farms with no intention of consuming the produce they leave with. Many of these pumpkins will endure the horror of being carved up, given a homely face and left to rot during the first frosts of the year. But not yours. Yours will get to live inside, eagerly awaiting their starring role in dinner.

Is that really the "best" thing I can do? Well, I think that's definitely a contender. Besides supporting your local economy, and farmers who actually grow things people eat, you will be taking a step to shore up a food supply at home (one that's not dependent on electrical refrigeration, by the way), and you'll be eating healthy vegetables on the way. Even before the pandemic, the government recommended having a three-month food supply at home for all Americans. Having more healthy, shelf-stable foods can be added safety and insulation against natural disaster, losing power, job-loss, rising inflation, stay-home orders, snow emergencies and supply chain issues at grocery stores.

You've driven by farm stands, pumpkin patches, orchards, and roadside wagons filled with pumpkins and winter squash of all kinds. Why not pull in this week and buy a bushel or two? Popular squash like butternut, acorn, and spaghetti are typically sold by the pound in grocery stores, which means these hefty fruits can sell for $5 or more apiece. But prices are reasonable if you buy directly from the farmer who grew them. I've purchased whole bushels for $10 before...that's usually around 15 squash or about 50lbs of healthy, locally grown food! Even $30 for a bushel will net you significant savings compared to the supermarket. Could you see using four winter squash in the next six months? Then you would likely save money buy buying fifteen of them now from a farm stand.

Winter squash will easily last several months, but curing them by letting them sit in the sunshine for a few days will extend their life much further. Six months is not an unreasonable amount of time for most varieties to last and some can hold out even longer. So those kabochas and Hubbards you buy in October can be enjoyed next spring!

And if you don't eat winter squash? You should start! They are delicious, healthy, and so versatile. Halve acorn squash and stuff them, put butternuts into tacos, enjoy spaghetti squash as you would pasta or noodles, slice delicatas to go onto salad, puree Pastila Shampans into soup, chop butternuts into cubes and roast or add to a curry, sugar pumpkins get turned into pies or muffins, vegans could make a fake cheese sauce that doesn't depend on cashews being shipped around the world, squash make a great base for broccoli soup, or you could add pureed squash to a chicken and rice casserole. Baked goods, casseroles, soups, salads, curries, tacos...whatever you're making there's a winter squash for that.

Dogs also love squash and pumpkins (my dog's favorite is galeux d'eysines...he gets wound up whenever I roast one), so if you find that you're not using your squash after all then your puppy will happily eat them. They are very healthy for dogs! If you don't have a dog and don't end up eating them, they'll at least have served as a pretty fall decoration and assurance of an adequate food supply in this uncertain time. So head to a nearby pumpkin patch and tell them you want a lot!