Re: Chestnut tips

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: : Okay folks.  Here are some tips into chestnuts.

: : The American Chestnut is the sweetest in the world.  Truly.  Problem is, some do-gooder who (once again) thought he could improve on nature brought a strain in from outside the country.  The strain (Chinese Chestnut) was resistant to a blight he didnt know they carried, and nearly ALL chestnut trees in America were eventually destroyed.  All that remain are Chinese Chestnut and European Chestnut.  The blight is so persistent, that even when you plant an American Chestnut today, it's lifespan is given as 10 years and no more than 20 before it acquires the blight and dies.  There is a foundation trying to bring the American Chestnut back into it's realm again through cross breeding, research, and funding.

: : The Chestnut was once so abundant, in the end of the 19th Century, that nearly 10% of the GNP for this country derived from it.  Forests were filled with them.  Lumber, nuts, oils etc from this one tree had thousands of uses.  Then the blight hit.  Within 50 years, they were ALL gone.

: : When fall comes, and the nuts are available, I buy pounds of them.  They are great in stuffing, added to vegetables, made into soup, roasted just as they are with salt and butter, and are a wonderful source of low-cholesterol and unsaturated fats and starch.  Far less than other nuts.  Besides being very yummy.

: : You can steam them or roast them and then shell them.  They will keep shelled in your lettuce bin for a month or two.  I usually roast them only till you can get the shell and skin off, then freeze them in half pound bags.  Kept this way, they will keep well in your freezer for 9 months or more.  When you want to enjoy them, just pull them out of the freezer, thaw or boil, and use.  Thaw and put in oven for a short time if you want them more like roasted.  

: : In lieu of those times when I cannot find a grocery store or access to fresh nuts, I have stockpiled cans of both whole chestnuts and purred chestnut.  It is the canned pureed chestnut I will be using for the soup.

: : Bill R

: ~~~~~~~~

: Bill:  Locally, we have a mountain named White Top, just north of Mountain City, TN, just east of Damascus, VA.  Most younger people think the name came from the fact that it's the highest local mountain and gets the most snow, but in fact the name came from when the chestnut trees would bloom in the spring, turning the entire mountain white.

: When we eat chestnuts, we just stand in our friend Laura's driveway and pick them up off the ground and eat them straight.  I know they're supposed to be good roasted, but I've never met anyone here in the southern highlands that can wait that long, we just eat them as we find them.  If it weren't for the horrible pods the chestnuts spring from, we'd plant some here on the farm, but those things are vicious on the ground.  I'll just go to Laura's.

: Look forward to your dish in June.

: NightSky



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