Growing zucchini with Hopi Pale Grey squash

I’m very interested in the Blue Hopi Squash and would grow only them (as far as squash goes) to keep them pure. We are into sharing ourselves and can help keep them going.

We had considered planting some zucchini but if that is a problem with crossing with the Hopi we would not grow the zucchini.

Christine Wasankari
Beaver, Washington

You can plant zucchini and other C. pepo squash and pumpkins and they won’t cross. Hopi Pale Grey are C. maxima, the same as other pumpkins and many winter squash. If you want some free seeds from me, send a SASE envelope to the magazine (PO Box 712, Gold Beach, OR 97444) and they’ll forward it onto us and I’ll send you some seeds. — Jackie

Canning milk

I’ve been making homemade condensed sweetened milk (from raw milk), but as I am now getting into canning more, would love to pressure can it to have it on hand to use whenever. Any ideas on the specifics? I’ve got a 20 quart All-American pressure canner. I was thinking of doing it in half-pint jars, similar to your cheese canning instructions — maybe 60 minutes at 15psi (we live at 5000 feet in Colorado)

Cathy Holcombe
Ault, Colorado

You can home can your homemade sweetened condensed milk using a pressure canner, but you don’t want to pressure can it for 60 minutes or it’ll be awful! Milk kind of caramelizes under pressure anyway and doing it for so long would result in yucky milk. You can also reduce your pressure to 13 pounds to help too. With the All American, which I have too, I use the 15-pound weight hole then adjust my heat to maintain the correct pressure. For me it’s 11 pounds and for you, 13 pounds. You would process your canned milk for 10 minutes.

The 60-minute processing you read about for cheese is for canning in a water bath canner, not a pressure canner. Makes a difference! — Jackie

8 COMMENTS

  1. Tauna,

    I checked out the Harris catalog and couldn’t find Hopi Pale Grey squash listed, only Blue Hubbard which kind of looks like HPGs.

  2. Kelli,

    One stamp isn’t usualy enough as the seeds really do need padding to keep them from being crushed in the mail=processing machines. Envelopes should be padded envelopes to prevent this but folks who have sent regular envelopes will find I’ve added padding and also extra postage as some kind people have sent extra stamps.

  3. Margie,

    Check out my article on seed saving in issue 129 of the magazine for complete details. You can plant any summer squash and other species of squash but for your C. maxima Hopi Pale Greys, such as butternut. But don’t plant any other C. maxima pumpkin or squash (many winter squash are C. maximas). If your nearby neighbors plant C. maximas, they may or may not pollinate with yours. You’ll just have to wait and see. You don’t see any oddballs the first year but will the second, after you have saved and planted the crossed seeds.

    Jackie

  4. Jackie, I was just wondering if when I send my self addressed stamped envelope for some Hopi seed, if one stamp is enough for the postage? Thanks :)

  5. I purchased Hopi Pale from Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds. Im trying to plant only Heirloom seeds. I not sure have far apart to plant on kind fron the other and what cant be planted near the Hopi

  6. Tauna,

    I didn’t realize that Harris carried Hopi Pale Grey squash. I’ll have to check it out. I’d like more companies to carry it to help it from going extinct.

    Jackie

  7. LOVE the picture of the canned squash! I will be trying that this week. I’m glad to know it can be a pumpkin pie. I bought some of the Hopi seeds last year from Harris. I hope they are the pure ones you talk about. Your pics of them look the same as mine.
    I still have 5 of the squash in my storage. They have done well. I can’t say the same for my banana squash. (Hopi is so much yummier!)

    Hope you stay dug out from the snow. I’m ready for spring.
    Have you got all your garden starts going?

  8. This message is for Cathy. Would mind sharing your recipe for making sweetened condensed milk? I actually have quite a bit of evaporated milk (10lb cans) the I have made yogurt from, but would love to see if I could tweak your recipe and then can. Any info would be helpful! Have a great Friday!

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