Pumpkins are for more than just Halloween in France

Anyone moving to France from the US or UK will associate the pumpkin with Halloween, Thanksgiving and candle-lit lanterns. But in France – as you would expect – the plant is principally associated with food. 

The pumpkin first came to the attention of the French in the 16th Century when explorer Jacques Cartier discovered in Canada what he described as “large melons” (translated informally to pompons). 

Christopher Columbus then brought pumpkins back to Europe, where they were introduced as a foodstuff. In the following century the French writer Charles Perrault wrote the fairy tale Cinderella (Cendrillon in French), in which the heroine’s coach is conjured from a pumpkin. 

The plant was by now cemented in French culture.

If you decide to grow pumpkins you will now have to wait until next year to sow the seeds and plant the seedlings outside once the risk of frost has passed. 

When shopping for seeds you will discover that there is a huge variety of shape, size and colour to choose from: seed merchants Kokopelli currently list 151 different varieties. 

This is because the plant is highly promiscuous and will cross fertilise with other varieties you may be growing, making it easy to develop new strains. 

Herein also lies a danger, however. Not all pumpkins are edible. 

Gourds, for example, cannot be eaten – some are highly poisonous. 

Use them for decoration only and they will last for months. 

Should you decide to sow some pumpkin seeds next year do not sow the seeds of the resulting fruit – they may have cross fertilised with something else and could produce fruit that looks edible, but isn’t.

If you visit a market to buy pumpkins you are likely to be bewildered by their names.

Courge is a catch-all word for pumpkins, summer squashes, marrows and courgettes.

Potiron is an elongated orange pumpkin with thick flesh and a lovely sweet taste. 

It is excellent for baking, purées and roasting. As they are large, you can often buy them in chunks.

Potimarron, however, is a smaller orange pumpkin shaped a little bit like an onion, but larger. It is also known as an onion squash or red kuri and is a personal favourite. 

The flesh has a chestnut-like flavour (from whence comes the marron part of its name). Its skin is thinner than a potiron’s and it will not keep as long.

Pomarine is a very small pumpkin that can be stuffed and baked whole. These are known elsewhere as Jack-be-Little.

Patissons can be white, orange or striped and look like tiny flying saucers. You can sauté, roast or grill them. They are known elsewhere as Pattypans. 

A citrouille is generally bigger than a potiron, with a distinctive rounded appearance. It is tougher and its flesh is less tender and flavoursome than a potiron, so is often used as decoration – as in a Halloween lantern – but is still edible.

Le butternut – self explanatory, really – is the other great favourite of mine.

Coloquintes are gourds. These are the inedible and for ornamental purposes only.

When you buy a pumpkin, make sure the stalk is present and intact so it lasts longer. 

Likewise, when you grow pumpkins, harvest them leaving a couple of inches of stem attached and allow the fruit to sit in the sun until the skin is nicely dry, firm and “seasoned”. 

You can then store them in a well ventilated barn for months.