Storing Sweet Chestnuts

[Toadflax]

Went for a walk this afternoon and came back with 6 1/2 lb of sweet chestnuts. We only usually have a small tin of them with our Christmas dinner brussels sprouts so I don't know how to keep them (or even many culinary uses).

Can they just be kept 'in a cool dry place' until I want to use them - i.e. will they keep OK or should I prepare and preserve them in some way.


Thanks



Geoff

 

[spamel]

I heard that they can be dried and ground into a flour. Our crop is crap! All of the nuts are puny, and they have nothing inside them that is edible. The hazelnuts were the same. Fruit has been good though.

 

[stevesteve]

I had been wondering whether anyone dried them ever since I stuck my hand in the pocket of my #3 fleece a couple of months ago to find a few knobbly bits. It turned out to be sweet chestnuts that I had collected last year and forgotten about.

They have air-dried and are quite tasty if you knaw off a little. I suspected that grinding them might yield a good nut-flour.

Cheers,
Steve

 

[spamel]

I reckon if you use the nutmeg grater on a cheese grater, you would getthe desired effect. Maybe that is how our ancients found how to do it, totally by accident.

 

[suburban bushwacker]

I blanch, peel and then freeze mine. Come crimbo they'll be chopped, mixed into sausage meat with pine nuts, the mix will be formed into balls and then the balls will be wrapped in bacon and baked. Yummy.

 

[Toadflax]

I blanch, peel and then freeze mine. Come crimbo they'll be chopped, mixed into sausage meat with pine nuts, the mix will be formed into balls and then the balls will be wrapped in bacon and baked. Yummy.

We normally parboil the sprouts, add bacon lardons and chestnuts and fry them up all together. But in previous years, my wife has always bought a packet of cooked peeled chestnuts, so this is the first year I'm going to have to do it for real.

But it was a good part of the annual cycle to collect these chestnuts. I first started getting properly serious about wild food this year (having thought about it on and off for years) and on my first foraging walk back in January or February I noticed this avenue of sweet chestnut trees and thought that I must remember them in the Autumn. I very rarely plan anything that far in advance, but it's a good feeling to know that 10 months ago I thought of this and have now completed that little plan.


Geoff

 

[Toadflax]

I'm going to try blanching, peeling and freezing some, but the freezer isn't that big so I'm wondering about bottling some of the rest, but can't find anything on Google about how to do it...

...wondering about a brine solution. Anyone ever done this?


Geoff

 

[suburban bushwacker]

The deli has them pickled, but i've not tried it myself.