Snake Gourds
(Page 2 of 4)
April/May 2005
William Woys Weaver
But being a tropical plant that requires warm nights to form fruit, the snake gourd never really caught on in Europe. Today, thanks to large Indian communities in the United States, the gourds can be purchased in most Asian markets year-round, and seeds are available from several U.S. mail-order companies.
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Cooking Snake Gourds
The snake gourd variety I grow is ‘Extra Long Dancer’ (see photo, below). I chose it because I can grow only one variety at a time, to prevent cross-pollination, and I wanted to see just how long I could get it to grow. ‘Extra Long Dancer’ also produces a lot of edible gourds, and I like the long, narrow shape of this variety for cooking. (Shorter varieties seem to have more waste.)
For the experimentally inclined cook, the best selection of snake gourd seed varieties can be purchased from Evergreen Seeds in California. Each of these types can be used in many kinds of recipes. For example, the white-skinned varieties often are used in chutneys or dishes calling for coconut milk. Many recipes are available through the Internet from Indian Web sites. One excellent place to look for recipes is The Hindu, India’s national English-language newspaper (go to www.thehindu.com and search for “snake gourd”). The only drawback is that some of the local Indian ingredients are not readily available in North America, especially fresh leaves of the curry plant.
But the snake gourd is quite adaptable. It can be stuffed, stir-fried, baked and prepared in the same manner as zucchini. In the recipe on below, I have created a simple curry that can be considered a light side dish for a meal where several types of curry are served. It can make an excellent vegetarian lunch, too, best eaten as a dip or topping on traditional Indian breads
Growing Snake Gourds
The culture of the snake gourd is similar to that of the cucumber, but for those gardeners who want to grow the gourd and also save seeds, a few tricks are worth knowing. First, this is not a vegetable that can be grown on the ground. You will need a trellis, arbor or chain-link fence to let the plant run free because each vine can grow as long as 20 feet. The support structure must be sturdy, too, because of the fruit’s weight. City gardeners with unsightly walls to cover could use this vegetable as a fast-growing screen, and rooftop gardeners can grow it in tubs if they provide strong overhead trellising for support. Fruit formation is not usually a problem unless you happen to live in areas with cool summer evenings. A damp, rainy climate like the Pacific Northwest also is detrimental.
