After having a lot of difficulty growing zucchini in my area due to pest and disease pressure, I gave Tromboncino squash a try from the species Cucurbita Moschata. we love the taste and texture of the Tromboncino squash and the pest/disease resistance is excellent. we also love that it can be trellised and we find that helps production. I’m looking for some more summer squash in the Cucurbita Moschata species and stumbled across Aehobak in my googling. they don’t seem to be common seeds in America so I was wondering if anyone has had experience growing them and what suppliers you might recommend for getting some seeds.
Check out King Ka Ae on Kitazawa seed site. I also see a few places that sell seed on etsy.and a few others that are possibles.
I also see a listing on Amazon but it is very expensive.
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I’ve never used this one, but the seeds are pretty cheap and they have lots in stock:
I’m trying them this year due to the same issue. I gt mine mostly from Kitazawa Seed co…
from what I could tell Kitazawa Seed Co. seemed to be the best place to get Korean Squash seeds. I got King Ka Ae - Hybrid, Teot Bat Put - Hybrid, and Early Bulam - Hybrid - Treated.
I would love to know how these Korean varieties worked for you this year. Were any of them an improvement over Tromboncino?
This is my second year growing Korean zucchini from Kitazawaseed.com.
I gave up growing the traditional zucchini we do and eat here in the US. Too many issues and the plants talked up a lot of space.
The climbing squash that is Korean zucchini kicks butt. Takes up no horizontal space unless you let it run off the trellis. Produces really well.
I like the fruit more than the store bought western zucchini as it is more dense and firmer so it stands up to soups and stir fries.
Haven’t had any issues with the plant itself.
PS if I ever get up the energy I’m going to stuff and fry some of the flowers. They are absolutely huge.
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all 3 of the Korean varieties were excellent, although I couldn’t tell the difference between the 2 round varieties in any way (flavor, productivity, vigor, etc…). one is treated seed and the other isn’t, that’s really the big difference.
I wouldn’t say any of them were an “improvement” over Tromboncino overall. sure they are more productive than tromboncino, but given the size of the tromboncino fruits they likely produced the same overall mass of fruit flesh per plant.
My main reasoning for growing tromboncino and these Korean varieties was for improved pest and disease resistance over other species of squash, namely zucchini. I have found the Koreans and tromboncino to be essentially borer immune (although practically they are defined as “resistant”) and more resistant to squash bugs. I grew up on home grown zucchini in NY but after moving to MD as an adult both squash bugs and vine borers reek havoc on my zucchini here and I barely get 1 or 2 fruit before the plant dies.
comparing the Korean squash to the tromboncino, the Korean types are earlier to fruit by a week or 2. also flavor wise the tromboncino is less like a zucchini (with the neck having a unique flavor when compared to the bulbus end with the seeds). the Korean types taste more similarly to a zucchini but the flesh is denser, less watery, without being fibrous, with a more pronounced nuttiness or umami flavor. overall I would say the flavor of the Korean types to be an improvement over zucchini. of the Koreans, my wife finds the round ones to be more mild than the straight ones but I can’t tell a difference when they are cooked. when cut, the interior is yellow, and unlike zucchini the seeds stay small, soft, and edible, even when the fruit get very large and overgrown.
as for squash bugs, I still had some issues, but I did close to zero pest management. the only thing I did was trim off the lower leaves within the first 2 feet or so of the ground and mulch the dirt with ez-straw. I did this a bit late in the season and I think if I did it earlier and occasionally sprayed some insecticidal soap on the nymphs, I would have had much fewer issues with the squash bugs.
I would HIGHLY recommend growing all 3 Korean squash varieties and tromboncino squash, especially if you have severe issues with pests like I do.
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^this.
Well stated post. Vertical gardening was my first reason for trying the Korean zucchini. Next was the absence of any pests and perfect pollination of the female flowers.
Having grown it, I highly prefer the taste, texture, and how it cooks over our typical western zucchini.
I’m making a zucchini lasagna tomorrow from mine.
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After writing this I remembered we had quite a few korean squash in the fridge that were starting to turn and needed to be cooked. they developed slightly softer divots in the skin as they aged in our fridge. inside though they looked completely normal. pictured are one of the round types and a long type split open. I cubed them and tossed them in olive oil, salt, and garlic powder, then cooked in my 6 qt air fryer at 400 for 15 mins. we had so many that were in this state of over ripeness that I had to cook them in 4 batches. the first batch that came out was split between myself and my 6 year old daughter. in addition to the nutty umami flavor, they also have a strong buttery flavor and a slight sweetness (more sweetness than a zucchini in my opinion). very tasty and addictive.
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