Sugar Baby

My Sugar Babies aren’t exactly babies this year. They have been weighing in at around 12 pounds and are about a foot in diameter. They have dark green skin with even darker stripes and juicy ruby red flesh. I have been cutting them in half to make it easier to wedge them into my refrigerator. Sugar Baby is a variety that is supposed to be the standard of the icebox melons, meaning they are smaller so they will easily fit into a refrigerator. Not this year.

Watermelons are thought to have originated in the African desert. There is evidence that watermelons were cultivated in the Nile Valley as early as 2000 BC. Watermelon seeds were found in Pharaoh Tutankhamun’s Egyptian tomb. Early French explorers found Native Americans cultivating them in the Mississippi Valley in the 1700s. Some watermelon seeds also found their way to America on ships full of African slaves.

Watermelons are more than ninety percent—you guessed it—water! So they make great slushies, watermelon lemonade, sorbet, fruit salad, and pickled watermelon rind. I have even found a recipe for watermelon cake that uses chunks of the melon in the cake but I’m a bit skeptical about it. In spite of all the wonderful recipes out there I have never gotten past this simple one:

One cold, deep pink wedge of vine ripened watermelon

Paper towels or napkins

Plate, knife, fork, and spoon optional

And for those misguided folks like my Mom and cousin—

Salt!