Melon Days

A couple of weekends ago, I had the pleasure of participating in "Melon Days".  It's a festival that's quite a big deal 'round these parts.  There are a few melon lords in the area- the Dunhams, the Veteres, and the Thayns.  The leader of the Dunham melon empire also happens to be the son of the woman who owns the building where our organization's thrift store is housed.  Her other son is the pastor of the Bible church where I attend, his daughter used to run our youth programs, and his son owns the house that I'm currently living in. Are you getting a sense of how things work in small towns?

These farmers grow variety melons (which I'm so sorry that you folks in Indiana can't experience) in addition to the typical cantelope, honeydew, watermelon, etc.  My favorite variety is probably Canary.  It's crisp and lightly sweet yet flavorful.  The Crenshaw variety, however, is referred to around here as "the Cadillac of melons".  It's pretty good too.

The Cadillac

So, Green River's version of a harvest festival is Melon Days.  It basically consists of a bunch of vendors in the city park, plus some special events like a seed spitting, watermelon carving, and watermelon eating contests.  Oh, and free melon.  So much melon.  In case you've never experienced this, I'll warn you that too much melon can lead to some... eh... unpleasant GI effects.

Hope's watermelon, on the far right, is clearly the best, which is why it won first place.  Also, this is a random child.  I don't know him.

The parade was pretty impressive, partly because it was led by a helicopter and partly because of the famous "largest watermelon" (But really?  How vague is that?  Largest of what??) that resides in Green River.  It's really just a slice of watermelon, it's made of wood, and it comes out on special occasions.

What could you wear to melon days but homemade watermelon shirts?

Epicenter, an arts&culture/economic development non-profit, hosted some artists who made this float for the parade.  The theme of the parade this year was "whatever floats your melon".  Phil, one of the artists, bicycled this melon boat through the whole parade, which I considered pretty impressive.

I must say, however, that I was a little less than impressed with the selection of greasy fair food, so if anyone wants to volunteer to come out and set up an elephant ear/tenderloin/milk shake stand to show them how it's done, I would totally support that.

This is my supervisor, Justin.  And this was a tornado dog, which consists of fried potatoes wrapped around a hot dog.  'Nough said.

The non-profit I work with, PACT, and the other non-profit in town, Epicenter, had an arts booth for kids where I was also selling melon popsicles.  Right before I left Indiana I kept joking that if my VISTA position wasn't great I would just open up a popsicle stand.  Ha.  Funny how life works.  My other new business plans since coming here include a bowling alley, a drive-in theater (both of which used to exist), and a gourmet hot dog stand.  Or all three?  There are a lot of abandoned buildings around here that need rescuing.  

You're never too old for a face painting.

The kids were making felt bracelets, which are pretty cool.  I decided to add goat heads to mine, and I'm now also going to open up an etsy site for "natural" studded bracelets.  It's going to take off, I'm sure of it.  (goat heads are these spiky seed things that come off of some plant here.  If you look closely at the third from the top, I think you'll see the upside down goat head.)

The week leading up to Melon Days I made 200 popsicles.  Here's another thing about Green River... "two day shipping" on Amazon really means "two week shipping".  Which led to me calling stores and driving around the state trying to find popsicle molds the weekend before.  For some reason, stores don't consider September to be popsicle-making season.  I did have one man tell me that in a week he would have his Christmas popsicle molds out... I can think of several things wrong with that.

I'm including the popsicle recipes below if you're interested.  The Coconut Crenshaw was heavily endorsed by Hope, and my favorite was probably the Watermelon Strawberry Mint.

Unfortunately because of poor stand placement we didn't sell as many popsicles as we would have liked.  But we made back our money and most people who tried them really liked them.  At one point, Hope (an introvert) and I decided to walk around the park peddling popsicles to sell more.  You can probably imagine how that went, but make sure you're picturing two tired girls walking around the park and weakly yelling "homemade popsicles" and avoiding eye contact.  Whatever I decide to do with my life, I can assure you that it will not involve peddling anything.  

From left to right, Honeylope Orange Cream, Watermelon Strawberry Mint, Coconut Crenshaw, and Honeydew Lime Avocado.

Kid tested and approved.  

Each of these recipes are for about 8 popsicles. My 8-popsicle molds held 2 cups of liquid, so you might need to adjust the recipe slightly depending on much yours hold.  Or you could use ice cube trays.

For all of these, just throw everything in a blender and pour into molds.  They're quite simple and quick when you're not making a million.  I wrapped mine in waxed paper and sealed with washi tape, which worked well.    

Watermelon Strawberry Mint
1.5 cups watermelon 
(seedless would make your life a lot easier.  Otherwise, blend and strain the seeds out)
0.5 cup roasted strawberries 
(roast until juices are running and the fruit is softened and browned)
2 T sugar
0.25 cup mint leaves
2 tsp lemon juice


Honeylope Orange Cream
(this one had mixed reviews... you have to really like cantelope and vanilla)
1.5 cups cantaloupe or honeyloupe
0.5 cups sweetened condensed milk
1/2 tsp vanilla
(or full fat vanilla yogurt)
2 T orange juice concentrate 


Honeydew Lime Avocado
1.5 cups honeydew melon
0.25 cup lime juice
0.5 medium avocado
2 T sugar
Water if necessary to thin


Coconut Crenshaw 
1.0 cup crenshaw melon (or any melon, really)
0.5 cup crushed canned pineapple
0.5 cups coconut milk
1/2 tsp coconut flavor 
(adding coconut shavings might be good if you like a little texture in your pops)


Happy Melon Days!