# Old butternut squash



## SunsetSonata (Nov 23, 2006)

I feel kind of silly posting about this, but then I think, why not? Someone here is bound to have an answer. 

I have a bushel of butternut squash since the fall, some I've cooked and frozen, but I still have a few left in storage. I noticed one was going bad - soft and developing a mold, so of course I ditched that one. I'm wondering about the salvagability of the rest, though. Most look fine, but I just found one that isn't soft or moldy yet, but does have telltale wrinkles in its skin. This one was in direct contact with the bad one and is obviously going downhill as well. I cut it open and the meat is a little slippery, but a normal healthy squash isn't exactly dry either. The meat smells SO SWEET! So I am cooking it now, but am wondering if there's any harm in it even if it tastes good.

Anyone ever eat a butternut that hasn't aged gracefully?

Yes, I really am posting about the edibility of an old squash!


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## Kazahleenah (Nov 3, 2004)

Yellow Squash Pickle Relish
8 cups grated yellow squash
2 cups chopped onions
1/4 cup salt
2 cups vinager
3 cups white sugar
2 Tablespoons celery seed
2 Tablespoons mustard seed
3 cups chopped sweet red bell peppers
1 cup chopped sweet green peppers

Mix squash, onion and salt. Let stand 1 hour in bowl, drain. Combine vinager, sugar, celery salt and mustard seed, boil. Add squash mixture and peppers, mix well and bring to a boil. Ladle into hot, sterile jars, wipe and seal. 

This relish is a "sweet and sour" relish. EXCELLENT on brats, as well as other things. 

Enjoy!


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## diane (May 4, 2002)

If it smelled good I am quite certain it was just fine. I just cooked up one a week ago that was starting to wrinkle and I am here to tell you I ate it, it was good and I didn't get sick. I tend to follow my nose. I know what good smells like and I know what rotten smells like. Good I eat, rotten the chickens eat.


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## Nellie (Oct 18, 2006)

I'm amazed our chickens aren't dying left and right!! 

I'll second the opinion, if it smells good, eat it!


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## SunsetSonata (Nov 23, 2006)

Well it's cooked, and it sure smelled good... but... apparently the heat drove up a whole slew of these white droplets that looked like glue!  I just couldn't fathom eating what I imagined to be some natural toxin from mold no matter how sweet it smelled. Maybe I'm a wuss. ;-) I betcha chickens WOULD love it while I'd be laid up for a week! Diane is this normal for older squash? I sure don't remember a white field of glue on any of the other squash I cooked. 

Thank you all for your responses. And hey I've got a great new relish recipe now!


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## wogglebug (May 22, 2004)

SunsetSonata said:


> Well it's cooked, and it sure smelled good... but... apparently the heat drove up a whole slew of these white droplets that looked like glue! ... I'm a wuss. ... Diane is this normal for older squash? I sure don't remember a white field of glue on any of the other squash I cooked.


Depends on how you cooked it. If not underwater, then white sap is normal in squash. You don't often see it in the kitchen, because the environment/fruit is too wet; although you can see it on cut stems or fruit picked before it's ripe (incidentally, milky sap is entirely normal - many plants have it - even lettuce). Anyway... heard of "the noble rot"? It's a fungal growth (botrytis) on grapes, much appreciated by certain vignerons. It dehydrates the grapes, thus making the remaining juice much sweeter. They make the most luscious super-sweet dessert wines - special varieties of Sauternes for instance. I'd guess that something similar may have happened to your squash - either alone or via the fungus. It semi-dehydrated, concentrating both the sap and the sugar.


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