Erntedank

Leer en español.

One of my favorite parts of Autumn in Germany is the Erntedankfest, which translates more or less as "harvest thanksgiving festival". Although it is not an official holiday, and its celebration is not as widespread or as important as Thanksgiving in the USA, it is still a nice way to start the fall season. While Erntedank is nowadays celebrated as a religious holiday by Christian churches across Germany, its roots (as is the case for other religious holidays) are pagan and go back much earlier. 

Where I live (a more or less "rural" area), many communities celebrate Erntedank with a small festival or market, featuring music, food and lovely golden autumn weather. In this strange year of 2020, however, most public celebrations have been cancelled, and the first days of October only brought rain and more rain. Since I missed such a nice part of the fall season, here I give thanks for my small harvest and hope for nicer days in the future...

This year I was surprised to discover a new squash plant growing among my Hokkaido and Butternut squash. I let it grow and was happy to find out that it was a variety of squash called pattypan (or, much nicer and en français, pâtisson), which probably grew from seeds in the compost. While it developed a bit late in the season, we nevertheless enjoyed many meals out of the three fruits that it produced.

A patisson squash - if harvested early enough it is tender and can be eaten with the skin.

This was also a good zucchini year, at least when compared with previous years of null harvest. I even had enough zucchini to bake an amazing cake (no recipe, just some ideas taken from the Internet, but great taste!). 

 

Since outside temperatures are already reaching one-digit Celsius numbers, today I took in the last tomatoes that were growing outside (although I still have some tomato plants in pots inside the greenhouse). Tomatoes ripen after being harvested, so I put them in a paper bag with an apple (it supposedly speeds up the process) to wait until they get red (they always do, even if sometimes it can take weeks). I also dug out a couple of potatoes that I had in a pot, and harvested a kohlrabi -- although those belong to a variety that grows until later in the fall, so its siblings will remain outside for a while. 

My last tomatoes, and some other vegetables.