LAST time I wrote about cucamelons they were still known as Mexican sour gherkins. Not the most enticing name, perhaps, but arguably less off-putting than its predecessor, which was mouse melon.  

“Mouse” referred to their size — each cucumber is about as big as a grape — and “melon” to their appearance. 

Their skins are mottled like watermelons, but don’t be fooled by the rebranding into thinking cucamelons taste of melon. 

They don’t: whatever you call it, this small, extraordinarily bounteous fruit is unashamedly a gherkin. Just for the record, its botanical name is Melothria scabra — and I’ve no idea what that means.

What I didn’t know about the cucamelon at the time of its previous appearance in this column, 12 years ago, is that it can be grown as a perennial, eliminating the need to buy more seeds next year.

Wait until the top-growth of your cucamelon plant is killed by the first frosts of autumn. The leaves and stems will go limp and slimy. 
Now you dig up the tuber, which the plant has formed during the summer for use as a storage organ over winter. 

Go carefully with your garden fork; the tubers are quite easily damaged at this point. I usually grow cucamelons in large pots, which makes harvesting the tubers a bit easier: I just empty the pots out, compost, tubers and all — albeit gently.

To store your cucamelon, you need somewhere cool, frost-free and rain-proof, such as a shed or garage. In there, put the tuber, which looks rather like a big, white radish, on a shelf for a few days until any soil clinging to it is dry. 

If you can then rub the soil off with your thumb, without damaging the skin at all, that’s probably worth doing, to prevent the tuber talking any diseases or hidden pests into hibernation with it.

Horticultural sand is an ideal medium for storing tubers and roots in, but a cheaper one is compost (seed, potting, or multi-purpose) which you’ve already used for growing things in or which you can use later for that purpose, after using it for this.

Put several inches of sand or compost, which should be slightly moist but not actually damp, into a plastic pot or a cardboard or wooden box, nestle the tuber into it, and then cover with several more inches.

At the very beginning of spring, start to bring your stored cucamelon back to life by planting the tuber in a new pot, with new compost, this time with about an inch of compost covering the tuber. 

Move it to a bright, warm windowsill, a conservatory or heated greenhouse, and plant it out in late spring or early summer after the last frost.

This head start should give you a longer season of growth, and therefore a bigger crop of “mice.” It’s worth the bother, because, despite being fashionable, cucamelons really are lovely to look at, easy to grow and delightful to eat.