Rachel Roddy’s recipe for pumpkin, beans, greens and cheese

Wedges of pumpkin smothered in olive oil and salt, roasted and added to a starchy bean broth topped with melted parmesan

It is impressive, I think, when someone can choose a melon or a pumpkin by a sniff or a shake. This ability usually involves nerve, too: the confidence to pick something up and examine it from all sides, and a skin thick enough not to be concerned by stallholders, supermarket managers or signs saying “Do not touch”. I don’t have any of the above, so I’m often disappointed by melons and pumpkins. I told my friend Alice this recently and she revealed her technique while we were shopping at Monteverde market. She often asks stallholders to cut melons, pumpkins or squashes open, promising that she will buy even if it’s furry or flavourless, but in the knowledge it’s a dud. And, of course, the cutter is then in a corner.

This, too, requires nerves and skin as thick as the knobbly, grey-green pumpkin I stood holding in a shop the other day. Shaking it didn’t tell me much and I didn’t ask, of course. Fortunately, it wasn’t a dud. Nor was it particularly brilliant; despite being a zucca marina di Chioggia, which are usually reliable things, with dense, orange flesh that is first and foremost savoury, with a sweetness that comes after. If only I’d had more nerve, or gone to another shop. Other pumpkin varieties to look out for are squat, dark-green kabocha, which has dry, starchy flesh with a butter and chestnut flavour and just a touch of sweetness; pale green-blue crown prince, which looks like someone has sat on it, and has dense flesh that reminds one of swede and sweet potato; red, green and white-striped turban squash, which indeed does look like a pumpkin wearing a turban, and has gentle flesh like butternut squash.

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