Chillicothe Squash a HUGE Hit!!!

[EllenD]

So I just made my guys their Thanksgiving Day feast (belated)...Everything was liked by all (they're all pigs, I swear they'll eat everything but the Harrison's pellets I've tried a million times)...but the biggest hit was the new Chillicothe Squash that they've never had before!

The appetizer was just some diced-up fresh Mango, nothing special there but they all like it...The main course was a new Chop recipe that included chopped Bok Choy, Red, Orange, and Yellow Bell Peppers, Green Beans, and a totally new ingredient, Chillicothe Squash. Someone told me about it at work, I'd never had it myself, and they had them at Walmart for $0.98 a piece, so you can't beat that...It's really soft and super easy to chop-up, and I think it takes-on the flavor of whatever it's mixed into, so in this case the Bell Peppers...They all went absolutely crazy for it and picked all the Chillicothe Squash out of the Chop!!! So keep that in the memory bank because even Duff ate a bunch of it, and she's not much for veggies...

I made homemade Egg-Food with Chick-Peas for desert (I had to physically remove them from this, and I made sure that they got this dead last so they wouldn't pig-out on it and ignore everything else)...Dylan the love-Dove went nuts on the Egg-Food, I actually had to put him in his cage and latch the door because he was dive-bombing the rest of them and wouldn't let them get near it.

 

[Laurasea]

What is home made egg food? I need to find a picture of that squash.

 

[EllenD]

The Chillicothe Squash look like light-green colored pears actually. That's what they remind me of, and that's actually what I thought they were when I first saw them at the store. A little larger than a pear, but not much.

Homemade Egg-Food is just that, it's Egg-Food you make at home, and it's easy to make...Basically what Egg-Food is, like the commercially-sold kind you buy at the pet shop (like Qwiko sells) is cooked whole-eggs that usually include the ground-up shells...
However, there's two different ways to make Egg-Food, one with the shells and one without...You can either hard-boil the eggs just until they are mashable, then peel the shell off and mash them up, OR you can do it the way I do it which includes the shell for the added calcium, phosphorous, etc.

I do it that way, and it's easy, and actually ends-up looking pretty much exactly like the Qwiko stuff you can buy...I simply crack large eggs into a microwave-safe container (I used 3 yesterday and it made a pretty huge amount of Egg-Food), then scramble the whole-eggs with a fork like you do when making scrambled eggs or an omelet. Then I set them aside, and I put the complete eggshells into a mortar/pestle (you could use a food-processor, etc.), and I grind the eggshells down into a really fine, kind of crumbly powder...Then I add about 1/4 of the eggshells to the mixed eggs, and microwave that for 1 minute. Remove from the microwave (at this point the eggs are slightly cooked, still with a lot of liquid) and I take a fork and start chopping the egg up into the tiniest pieces I can get them into. At this point there's still a lot of liquid, so you're not going to get it into pieces yet, just "chop" it up with the edge of the fork...Then add 1/2 of the remaining egg shells, and use the fork to mix the shell powder in, then microwave for another minute...Then take it out, at this point you've got basically a scrambled egg patty...add the rest of the eggshell powder and use the side of the fork to "chop" the egg into tiny pieces, and microwave one more time for 30 seconds...Then once more use the edge of the fork to chop it into tiny pieces...It should end-up looking almost exactly like what the Qwiko bagged Egg-Food looks like, just softer because it's not dry...Then let it cool down and feast!!! The nice thing about this is that you can keep it in the fridge or freeze it too, and reheat it...it will become harder, just like the bagged stuff, but they love it...Easy, healthy, and great for any egg-laying females...