The gourd things in life
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Of all the fairy tales we loved as children, Cinderella is the one that feminists most decry as morally reprehensible. And not just feminists. Stigmatised stepmothers despise their demonisation.
Environmentalists tut-tut at all those swept ashes. Uber drivers reckon Cinderella should have been charged surge pricing for her midnight carriage. Sisters, who aren’t generally inclined to lop off their toes to steal their little sister’s boyfriends, mock its depiction of sibling rivalry. And grandmothers and fairy godmothers the world over are forever destined to disappoint their charges with the truth of the matter: sorry, poppet, I can’t actually just wave a wand and turn you into a princess tonight.
Indeed, Cinderella’s rags-toriches tale of stereotypical female socialisation and patriarchal convention as a route to domestic redemption – anyone can escape oppression, or at least anyone who looks smokin’ hot (yet virginal) in a pair of glass slippers – offends so many of our modern sensibilities that entire academic treatises have been written about the pros and cons of its plot.
I couldn’t give two hoots for any of that, however. What gets up my nose is the ridiculous notion that pumpkins are some kind of magical teleportal to a better life, where handsome princes host charity balls and any pretty little lady in a posh frock can waltz past palace security without an official invite.
You can probably guess that I hold the pumpkin in contempt for its key role in perpetuating this myth. Pumpkins are many things – easy to grow in summer, cheap and plentiful in winter – but they wouldn’t get a Warrant of Fitness from any vehicle inspector.
I grow a lot of pumpkins, but I don’t eat a lot of pumpkins. Pumpkins are my winter vegetable of last resort: I’d rather eat rosemary-roasted potatoes, quince-jelly glazed carrots, creamy pureed parsnips, mashed swedes, cauliflower blanketed with cheese sauce, buttery sauteed cabbage, and kumara drizzled with orange juice and honey. I’d rather eat kale and broccoli than pumpkin, and that’s not saying much.
When I was a child, we only ever ate pumpkin roasted, and the only pumpkin Mum ever roasted was the grey-skinned crown variety. (How ironic! Such a pompously regal name for such a humble gourd.) Occasionally, however, my late Uncle John would gift us one of his wonderfully misshapen heirloom ‘Triamble’ pumpkins, an ironskinned behemoth that had to be ceremoniously dismembered with the woodshed axe.
A confession: I lied when I said we only ever ate roast pumpkin when I was a child. Mum roasted it, but I sure as hell never ate it. I hid it up my sleeves, slid it down the side of the couch (on TV dinner evenings). and fed it to our cat, Biggles (as she grew decrepit and more demented, she’d swallow anything). That’s because pumpkin has a peculiar ability to antagonise my gag reflex. Pumpkin, literally, makes me barf.
Since adulthood, the only time I’ve voluntarily eaten pumpkin – an entree of creamy pumpkin and coriander soup at a friend’s dinner party – I swallowed a spoonful (good manners) and involuntarily retched in front of the other guests (not such good manners).
The problem with pumpkin, in winter especially, is that it’s everywhere, in everything. In cafes, the soup of the day is always orange, and evil lurks under the cheesy crust of every other innocuous vegetarian frittata. It’s even spread on my children’s toast.
A few years ago, NZ Gardener reader Linda Laursen attempted to sway my tastebuds to the gourd things in life with her unusual recipe for pumpkin preserves.
Peel and chop 1.8kg pumpkin into cubes. Cover with salted water and simmer, covered, until the pumpkin is tender. Puree with a stick blender (don’t drain out the water), then stir in 1.8kg sugar, 220g butter, the juice and zest of 5 lemons, 1 teaspoon cinnamon, and 1 teaspoon vanilla paste. Boil for 1 hour, or until thick, stirring from time to time, then pour into jars and seal.
Pumpkin, miraculously transformed into a thing of beauty! As the Prince might have said of Cinderella, it’s a keeper. Entertainment director: Steve Kilgallon; steve.kilgallon@fairfaxmedia.co.nz; Travel director: Trupti Biradar; trupti.biradar@fairfaxmedia.co.nz; Print director: June-Ann Russell june-ann.russell@fairfaxmedia.co.nz; Advertising manager: Steven A. Hutton; steven.hutton@fairfaxmedia.co.nz.