Achocha

[mrsbusy]

Has anyone tried growing achocha,? I was given 10 seeds and 9 have germinated much to my surprise - the seeds were really weird - I should have taken a photo.
just wondering if they are worth growing.
I've never heard of them!

[CurlyGreen]

I've grown them a few times. A smaller one, Fat Baby and then Giant Achocha which was better. Worth it? Hard to say. The plants tend to sit around not doing much, and will then go mad and take up loads of space and produce lots at the end of the season. The fruits are fine with no particular flavour. Can add to salads or cook. They are usually easy to grow but need a lot of climbing space. 2 plants would usually produce enough for most people. They are probably worth a go if you have space. I definitely wouldn't plant out more than 4 and keep the others as backups. Slugs were quite partial to the seedlings.

The large harvest came after a lot of other things like beans and cucumber had given up. They were fun to try and I should give them another go. But they didn't become essential. The fruit aren't as tasty as peppers or beans.

[mrsbusy]

Ok thanks for your reply curly green.
We have our village fete this afternoon with an allotment stall which I am helping out with - I will put them out maybe someone will be interested enough to buy one or two but I'd better put a decent label on them as I suspect my ignorance will be others too!
I did look on line and got some idea of what they are but not whether they are worth the effort and space as you say.

[Nicos]

I’ve grown them too - Fat Baby.
They do climb like crazy and are better picked young.
Would I grow them again? - yes, I do have a few seeds ( they are a strange shape aren’t they?) but certainly not as a staple, and nope, once the seeds have gone I won’t replace them.
Nice bit of edible fun/ experience.

[ameno]

I gre them year before last. Two plants gave far more than I could eat from mid to late July onward. In the end I just gave up picking them. Turned out I didn't much like them, anyway.
ALso, all the seeds survived on the compost bin and came up like weeds everywhere the following year.

If you like bland veg which cook down to goop very quickly then you won't be disappointed with the yield and vigour.

[Nicos]

^^^^ ha ha!…spot on with their description ameno.

I used them to pad out curries etc with the promise that maybe they have different vitamins and minerals to the rest of the contents of said food.
I had one which I didn’t grow vertically and it did make good ground cover ( thinking of it as being a living mulch)