SPINNING SQUASH INTO GOLD — mykitcheninspain.blogspot.com

Now that I’ve actually made angel’s hair, I can divulge the secrets of cidra. It indeed has a tough hide, like leather. This is probably why it has an extremely long “shelf life.” I was able to pierce it with a knife and prise it open. But, hey, if dropping it on the floor works, go for it. But, no, cidra is not the same as spaghetti squash, which is a cultivar of Cucurbita pepo. (I still can’t say if spaghetti squash would work in the confection of angel’s hair. I intended to settle the issue, but my home-grown spaghetti squash turned out to be a butternut mutant and did not separate into strands.)  And, although the name "cidra" is also used in South America to designate the chayote (see last week’s blog for a photo of that green cucurbita), the Malabar gourd is different from chayote.

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