Now that’s a great pumpkin!
The Zambito family, the reigning pumpkin kings of Kensington who gained attention after displaying a 502-pound gourd outside of their home last October, have outdone themselves with their new 800-pound bohemeth.
Like last year’s crop, this year’s squash-zilla was grown at the family’s upstate home before being brought to their McDonald Avenue abode, and put on display for the entire neighborhood to see.
“We were actually hoping for larger,” said matriarch Dawn Zambito, whose family splits time between upstate Norwich and Brooklyn.
The pumpkin — which is known as an Atlantic Giant — may have grown upstate, but it got its start right here last May — potentially making it one of the largest crops ever born in Brooklyn.
“My husband puts the seeds in the cups in our boiler room here,” said Zambito. “That’s where he starts them to germinate.”
The 800-pound monster was sprouted from a particularly fat seed from last year’s pumpkin before heading upstate, where it benefited from the heavy rains of the last few months.
On Oct. 11 — the day the gourd was harvested and transported — it took 10 people just to get the pumpkin on a friend’s pick-up truck in Norwich — and another 10 people to unload it in Brooklyn.
“You know how the flatbed goes down on a truck when you put something heavy on it?” Zambito said. “We actually dented it.”
She assured us that they fixed their friend’s pick-up bed.
The Zambitos don’t have plans to make a giant jack-o’-lantern, but they will cut up the thing sometime after Halloween and give most of it away to friends and neighbors.
Somebody better have a good pumpkin-pie recipe on hand.
Reach reporter Eli Rosenberg at erosenberg@cnglocal.com or by calling (718) 260-2531. And follow his Tweets at @from_where_isit.
