Giant Pumpkin takes centre stage
LINDEN – Who knew giant pumpkins weren't just a fairy tale! The Walkerville Agricultural show provides pumpkins which provide intrigue and feed the masses.
LINDEN – The Livingseeds Giant Pumpkin competition hosted by the Walkerville Agricultural show sees many hopefuls, pumpkin in hand, line up to guess who is the ultimate pumpkin master.
The Cheese Gourmet in Linden is the location of the continuation of more pumpkin- inspired fun and a giant pumpkin competition, where patrons were encouraged to guess the weight of the pumpkin in-store for a prize. It was one of the smaller pumpkins which weighed 56kg, the winning guess was 1kg off.
Agricultural enthusiasts everywhere will be intrigued by the competition to growing the largest pumpkin in weight. The competition is run for a period of 80 days where people are encouraged to enter the heaviest pumpkin. The pumpkins are measured in kilograms. After the competition ended, the Livingseeds organisation donated excess pumpkins to various organisations including Nosh Food Rescue run by Hanneke van Linge after hearing about the feeding scheme. Livingseeds harvests the seeds of winning pumpkins to resell them to people and entrants of the pumpkin-growing competition. This handover was facilitated by professional chef Owen Jullies who is an agricultural enthusiast who believes the key to growing vegetables successfully is staggering their growth. The technique he uses in his own vegetable garden is growing vegetables in tyres to ensure no waste.
The winning pumpkin at the Walkerville Agricultural show was something fairy tales are made of, weighing in at a colossal 613kg, grown by Peet Joubert. The size of the pumpkin recalls Cinderella’s giant pumpkin mobile, with its immense size. People struggled to wrap their bodies around this giant orange vegetable due to its immense girth.
“The pumpkin in the restaurant at Cheese Gourmet was actually one of the four smaller pumpkins from the Livingseeds competition at 56kg,” explained van Linge. The winning guess of the weight of the pumpkin was 57kg by Odd Plate Dinner attendee Sean Lawrence. The pumpkin added an element of fun to the night focused on raising awareness around food waste and pumpkin-inspired dishes.
Get in touch with Nosh Food Rescue to join in on the conversation: Facebook page Nosh Food Rescue NPC; 011 793 6390, tweet them at @noshfoodrescue; and follow them on Instagram: @noshfoodrescueNPC; hanneke@noshfoodrescue.co.za
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