Calabash

Calabash, also known as bottle gourd or long melon, is a versatile gourd with smooth, pale green skin and spongy white flesh. When harvested young for eating, it has a mild, slightly sweet flavour similar to zucchini or choko, and a tender texture that absorbs other flavours well.

It’s a staple vegetable in many Asian cuisines — popular in Indian curries and dals, Chinese stir-fries and soups, and Southeast Asian stews. The flesh cooks down quickly and works well in braises and slow-cooked dishes. In Australia, calabash is readily found at Asian grocers and some farmers’ markets.

If left to mature on the vine, the flesh dries out and the shell hardens into a natural container — historically one of humanity’s first cultivated plants, grown more for its usefulness as a vessel than as food.