the.com/patty pan
A flying-saucer squash that crash-landed in your garden and dared you to grill it.
means A small, round, scallop-edged summer squash (also called scallop or scallopini squash), or the shallow pan used for baking small cakes and patties.
from A compound of "patty" and "pan." "Patty" comes from the French "pâté," via the older English "pasty," meaning a small flat cake of food; "pan" is the everyday cooking vessel, from Old English "panne" (related to Dutch "pan" and German "Pfanne," possibly drawn from Latin "patina," a shallow dish). So a "patty pan" was first the little pan you baked patties in — and the squash, with its scalloped saucer shape echoing those fluted tins, borrowed the name by sheer resemblance.
- shape
- Scalloped edges like a tiny UFO
- also called
- Sunburst or scallop squash
- native roots
- Cultivated by Indigenous Americans for millennia
- best young
- Picked small, before seeds turn tough
- whole edible
- Skin, flesh, and seeds all eaten
patty pan squash — scalloped summer squash variety, pale green or white, commonly grown in home gardens across north america
patty pan cake — small individual cake baked in a paper cake case, popular british tea time treat since the 1800s