Chicken and chestnuts stew 鶏肉と栗の煮込み

For some years we have gotten fresh North American chestnuts from California. It is a lot of work to peel/clean chestnuts. It is particularly hard to remove the internal brown membrane or “shibukawa” 渋皮 that extends into the meat of the chestnut and is a particular characteristic of North American chestnuts.  The chestnuts we got from California last year were a bit disappointing. They were kind of dry and chalky. So this year we got prepared chestnuts in a jar. According to the label they appear to have been packaged/processed in France but the chestnuts themselves originated in unspecified EU countries. It said “roasted chestnuts” but in fact they were steamed. When we opened the jar, many of the chestnuts were fragmented with a few whole intact chestnuts tucked in at the top. They were not sweetened and tasted fairly good with nice texture**. So I decided use the chestnuts for this stew dish I saw on line. Since I had leftover daikon and burdock root I need to use up this recipe was a perfect choice. Although the recipe calls for “renkon” 蓮根 lotus root, I did not have it. I made this one weekend morning and served this as a lunch with kinpira-gobou 金平牛蒡 and rice.

**Interestingly, my wife discovered while eating the dish I made that several of the chestnuts indeed had the internal  brown membrane. These membranes were left in the nut and the nut was just processed as if they weren’t there. It was a rather unpleasant surprise to bite down unexpectedly on the hard shell-like substance. After that she recommended checking the chestnuts as they come out of the jar and if necessary dismantling them to remove any membrane left. We saw this as a sloppy element of the processing. 

Not all the items I put in the dish are seen in the picture. I also put in konjack or konnyaku こんにゃく．The seasoning is typical Japanese but the kobou flavor comes through strongly. While simmering, the chestnuts broke into large chunks but tasted good.

According to the recipe the chicken was to be cooked in water with sake and scallion before adding to the rest of the ingredients. I would have just put the cut up chicken into the stew. I suppose this extra process would reduce “chicken-ness”.

Ingredients (at least 4 fairly good size servings).
For pre-cooking of the chicken
Two chicken thigh, bone removed (I left the skin on) .
2 tbs sake
2 scallions
several slices of ginger
12000 ml water

For stew
2-3 inch daikon, peeled, cut into 1/2 inch thick rounds and then quarters
2-3 carrots, peeled and cut into bite sized pieces (“rangiri” 乱切り cut at 45 degree angle as you rotate the carrot)
1/2 “gobou” burdock root, skin scraped off using the back of the knife and also cut into bite sized pieces using “rangiri”
2 inch long renkon, skin peeled and cut into 1/4 inch thick half moon (I did not have renkon).
1/2 Konnyaku, torn into small bite sized pieces by hand (irregular shapes increase the surface areas), parboiled and drained
10-15 parboiled green beans
12-15 chestnuts (original recipe calls for roasted and sweetened chestnuts called “Tenshin amaguri” 天津甘栗.

For cooking liquid
250ml of the water in which the chicken was cooked
250ml dashi broth
100ml sake
3 tbs mirin
3 tbs soy sauce
1-2 slices of ginger cut into julienne

Directions:
For pre-cooking the chicken
Add the sake, ginger and scallion to the water and let it come to a boil then place the chicken into the water.
Turn down the flame to simmer and let it cook for 5 minutes and then turn off the flame. Let it stand for 15 minutes (the original instructions said cook for15 minutes but I thought that would be overcooking especially since the chicken will be simmered again with the vegetables).
Take out the chicken and cut into bite sizes pieces.
Keep the water which was used for cooking the chicken to  cook the vegetables.

For stew
Add the chicken cooking liquid to a pan
Add the chicken, vegetables and konnyaku
Cook them on medium high flame
Once it starts boiling, turn down to simmer, add the chestnuts and cook for 20 minutes.
Add the green beans in the last 5 minutes.

This has a typical Japanese flavor profile. I am not sure pre-cooking the chicken is necessary. The prepared chestnuts had a natural sweetness and the entire dish was really nice if not outstanding. The quality of the jarred chestnuts was not the best we have ever had but it was still a lot easier then trying to process the raw chestnuts and tasted better too. 

Sweet simmered chestnuts with inner skin 渋皮煮

Although the North American chestnut tree was decimated by the chestnut blight (fungal disease) by 1940, there are still pockets of mature North American chestnut trees remaining as I posted previously. As usual, I got North American chestnuts from Girolami farm. Since I posted all the dishes I could think of that used chestnuts, I decided to try “Shibukawa-ni” 渋皮煮 which was also a part of Sushitaro New year’s osechi box.

Chestnuts are packaged by nature in many layers that have to be removed to reveal the eatable part. These layers include the prickly outer hull called “Iga” イガ, the hard outer shell (called “onikawa” 鬼皮) and inner papery skin (called “shibukawa” 渋皮). This particular preparation, however, the inner skin or shibukawa does not have to be removed. I consulted a few on-line recipes and decided to follow this recipe (in Japanese with pictures).

To remove the outer skin: I used the same technique I usually use but with some modification.  I first soaked the chestnuts in cold water for several hours and then brought the water with the chestnuts in it to a boil. As soon as It started boiling, I turned off the flame and let the chestnuts soak until they were cool enough to handle (a few hours).

I removed the hard outer shell using a paring knife which was not too difficult. I did have to be careful not to knick the inner skin (if the inner skin is damaged, the chestnuts will crumble during cooking) .

I then placed the chestnuts with the inner skin intact in a pot with water just covering the chestnuts (see below) and added baking soda (about 1 and half tsp into 400ml water)

As you can see below the water gets totally dark brown with scum appearing on the surface of the water (see below)

I skimmed the scum and after 15 minutes of simmering, removed the chestnuts with a slotted spoon and placed them in cold water. I rubbed the surface of the chestnuts and tried to removed any coarse strands on the surface while being careful not to damage the inner skin.  I repeated this process two more times for a total of 3 times.

The fourth time I repeated the process I turned the flame to simmer after it started to boil and added sugar in two increments (about 400grams but the amount is totally up to you. Making it very sweet, is appropriate if the chestnuts are going to be used as a dessert. Making the chestnuts less sweet, is appropriate if the chestnuts are going to be used as an appetizer). After 15 minutes, I turned off the flame and added brandy (about 20-30 ml but this is optional). I let it cool down.

We were somewhat disappointed with the end result after all this work. Compared to Japanese chestnuts, the inner skin of American chestnuts is much thicker and goes deeply into the crevasses. Although this method makes it possible to eat the skin, it is still very noticeable. It is not as soft as it would be using Japanese chestnuts. After all that work I forged ahead and ate the skin but my wife was much less invested in the process and ate only the nuts leaving the skin behind when she could. If we are going to make a similar dish again, we prefer “Kanro-ni” 甘露煮 much better.

Chestnuts rice with North American Chestnuts 北米栗の栗ご飯

Last year I posted chestnuts rice or 栗ご飯. The chestnuts I bought at the gourmet market were probably of European origin and not particularly fresh. They were basically tasteless and had a really chalky consistency. In that post, I also mentioned that almost all North American chestnut trees were wiped out by the Chestnuts blight around 1940. But, at that time, by searching on the web, I found out that small numbers of chestnut groves survived and some farms are indeed producing North American chestnuts. By the time I got onto this last year, the season was over and I could not get the North American Chestnuts. This year, I was prepared and as soon as the chestnuts season came around, I placed my order. Although there are a few farms that sell chestnuts, mine came from Girolami farms in Califronia.

Here is a 3 lb bag of North American chestnuts I received (#1 below). They look excellent and are fairly big.

Chestnuts preparation: I soaked the chestnuts in boiling water (off heat) and let them soak until the water cooled down to room temperature. This softened the outer skin ("onikawa" 鬼皮 or demon skin) and made them easier to peel. Using a sharp paring knife, I first cut the bottom of the chestnut and peeled off the outer skin and then removed the inner skin ("shibukawa" 渋皮 or bitter skin). The inner skin was more difficult to remove, although for some I got lucky and it came off in one piece. For many of them I had to shave off some of the meat of the nuts to get the skin off (#2 below). I prepared 11 chestnuts (for 2 Japanese cups or 360ml of uncooked rice). As I peeled the inner skin I soaked the nuts in water to prevent discoloration and some starch leached out as well.

Rice: I used two cups (the measuring cup that came with the rice cooker--180ml. I understand that a regular Japanese cup is 200ml and an American cup is 240ml) of rice (360ml); a combination of regular Japanese short grain rice (Koshihikari コシヒカリ variety from California called "Kagayaki" かがやき) and "mochigome" 餅米 (glutenous or sweet rice), one rice cooker cup (180ml) each. After washing the rice in running cold water until the water ran clear. I drained the rice in a fine meshed strainer and let it sit in the strainer until I was ready to cook it.

Broth: I decided to use a seasoned "dashi" broth for this dish. I made dashi broth from a dash pack (combination of bonito flakes and kelp). In the cooled down dash broth, I added light colored soy sauce or "usukuchi shouyu 薄口醤油 (1 tbs) and mirin (1 tbs) and made it 400ml total.

Cooking: I used "Kamadosan" かまどさん, an earthenware rice cooker. I added the rice, broth and, for a good measure, a 3 inch square of dried kelp (surface wiped with damp paper towel) and arranged the prepared chestnuts on the surface. As per the instructions that came with the rice cooker, I set the steam holes of the inner and outer lids perpendicular to each other and placed it on a medium high flame for 14 minutes. I then shut off the heat and let it steep for 20 more minutes (#4 above).

While the rice was steeping, I made a small cucumber and myouga sunomono 胡瓜と茗荷の酢の物 (left in the back in the first picture).

I removed the kelp and mixed the rice while trying not to break the chestnuts. The bottom had a very slight crust of "okoge" おこげ. I served it with a garnish of black sesame seeds (The first picture above). 

The result? Much better than last year--a world of difference. The chestnuts were much sweeter and while they had the somewhat dry texture characteristic of chestnuts, it was pleasing and definately not chalky.  The  addition of the glutenous rice gave the dish a sticky consistency or "mochimochi" もちもち consistency. The seasoned broth that I used also added a subtle but nice flavor. So, I have to say this was a success. We are glad that North American chestnuts have survived and we can enjoy them. 

Chestnuts simmered in syrup 栗の甘露煮

We are into the chestnuts season once again. This year, I was Johnny-on-the-spot and pre-ordered them. I got North American Chestnuts from Girolami farm as before (#1 in the picture below). As I mentioned in last year’s post on chestnuts, it is wonderful to know some North American chestnuts trees survived the chestnut blight. American chestnuts, unlike Japanese chestnuts have a brown skin that goes deep into the nut. It is extremely bitter and unpleasant if left in the nut. But it is also very difficult to remove. Last year was a series of trial and error to come up with the best way to peel both the outer and inner skins (Onikawa 鬼皮and Shijukawa 渋皮, respectively. I finally found the secret. I peel the chestnut while it is still hot and the brown skin just lifts out. If you wait until it cools it is impossible to remove. This method, however, while successful, requires asbestos fingers.

This year I am providing some visual aids.The chestnuts came in a net bag (1 lb). I soaked them in water for several hours and then boiled them gently for 15-20 minutes (counting the time after the water came to the boil). I let it sit and cool down a bit--for 20-30 minutes. I scooped the chestnuts out of the water using a slotted spoon 3-4 at a time. While still very warm, I sliced off the flat bottom part using a sharp paring knife (#2). I kept peeling the outer skin by pulling it up from the initial cut (#3). Then, just tugging gently on the inner skin, it came off easily even from deep within the crevices (#4), Some chestnuts, however,had crevices made by the brown skin, so deep it almost divided the nut into two separate pieces. In that case, removing the inner skin breaks the whole chestnut apart. This year, my wife helped me removing the inner skin which sped up the process significantly.


Since I have already posted quite a few recipes using chestnut, I decided to make “Kuri-no-kanroni 栗の甘露煮. I usually buy this ready-made and sold in a jar. Most of the time, I use this in my “Chawan mushi” 茶碗蒸し.The commercial ones have both outer and inner skins cut away and the surface is smooth. The color is also bright yellow which make me think they use some kind of dye (natural dye or otherwise).
In my case, I used cooked and cleaned chestnuts like you see below (#1). For this amount of chestnuts, I prepared 200ml of water with 100grams of sugar dissolved poured over the chestnuts covering the chestnuts completely. I simmered gently for 20 minutes with the lid slightly askew (#2). I added a pinch of salt toward the end of cooking (to enhance the sweetness, although this may sound odd). I scooped up the chestnuts and placed then in a glass jar (#3). I reduced the remaining syrup for a few minutes and poured it over the chestnuts (#4).
.
My kanroni does not look as pretty as the commercial kind but it tasted very good and can be eaten as a snack/dessert or, as I mentioned, in chawanmushi.

Chestnut rice 栗ごはん

Chestnuts are such a typical seasonal food item in Japan for deepening autumn.  As a kid in Japan, we ate them every fall, usually boiled and it was something I generally liked. We had quite a few mature chestnut trees in our neighborhood. Many half open "Iga" いが or outer prickly shells were on the ground and getting chestnuts from those shells was always tricky for young kids. The trick was getting the nut without being pricked. In North America, because of  Chestnut blight, most of the North American Chestnuts trees were wiped out by 1940. Chestnuts, maybe as a result,  appear not to be a very popular food item. The vast majority of chestnuts we see here are imported from Europe (see P.S. below). My wife tells me that her childhood memory of chestnuts was the yearly ordeal (usually around Christmas) of roasting them in the shell over an open fire in the fireplace. While they smelled great, they weren't worth the bother. Once she busted into them, they were a major disappointment--dry, chalky, tasteless.

On one of our first trips to Japan as a married couple, we came across a roasted sweet chestnut vendor, "tenshin amaguri" 天津甘栗, under the raised railroad tracks in Shinbashi 新橋 area of Tokyo. The smell wafting from the cart was divine. I suggested we get some and my wife said, "Don't bother" and kept walking. I got them anyway and the smell enticed her to try some. She was astounded at how good they were. She insisted they couldn't be the same thing she ate as a child. Last week I found chestnuts in the shell at our gourmet grocery store. I, again, could not resist and got some chestnuts for a Japanese chestnut rice or "kurigohan" 栗ごはん. Again my wife advised, "Don't bother" and warned me that they would not taste like the ones I was used to.

I first soaked the chestnuts (15 or so, upper left in the image below) in water for several hours to make it easier to peel the outer hard skin. You could also parboil to make it easier to remove the skin. It is easy to take off the hard skin called "onikawa" 鬼皮 by cutting off the bottom and peeling off the hard skin but the chestnuts are still covered with the bitter-tasting inner skin (upper right). The most labor intensive part is removing the inner skin called "shibukawa" 渋皮 meaning "bitter skin". I just used a small paring knife to remove the inner skin but it is not easy. I put these cleaned chestnuts into water to prevent discoloration (lower left).

I again used the earthenware rice cooker called "Kamado san" like I did when I made "Matsutake gohan", I used kelp soaked water and added sake (2 tbs) and salt (1 tsp) to make 400ml of the cooking liquid. I did not use soy sauce to prevent the rice from darkening. I washed and drained the rice (2 Japanese cups or 360ml). I added the rice and the liquid into the cooker, and placed cleaned chestnuts on the top  (lower right in the above image). As per the instruction that came with the cooker, I put on the inner lid and then the outer lid. I cooked it on a medium high flame for 14 minutes and then let it stand for 20 minutes.

Here is the end product (above). I was a bit disappointed--I "shouldn't have bothered". The chestnuts were dry, chalky and pretty tasteless (as my wife predicted), although they were certainly edible. The rice itself was quite nice. We may try this again with bottled boiled chestnuts from France next time. But at least, I feel like I paid some respect to autumn, which has firmly arrived here.

P.S. After I posted this, an interesting article appeared in Washington post regrading chestnuts including different types and origins of the chestnuts imported here.

Boiled Chestnuts 茹で栗

This is continuation of the North American chestnut theme derived from the chestnuts I mail ordered from a farm in California. The chestnut rice was a success. I decided to just simply boil the chestnuts since this was the most common way I enjoyed them as a kid in Japan and we collected chestnuts from the neighborhood chestnut trees.

Obviously my mother cooked the chestnuts when I was a kid and I do not remember how long she cooked them. The pamphlet that came with the chestnuts had some information but I decided to do a web search and settled on this method.

I first soaked the chestnuts in cold water just enough to cover for several hours (close to 6 hours).  I poured the water to just covered the chestnuts, then added a pinch of salt. I placed the pot on a medium flame. As soon as the water started boiling, I tuned it down to simmer with the lid on. I boiled it for 40 minutes mixing the chestnuts once during the cooking. I let it sit in the pot until the water cooled to room temperature and then drained (Picture above).

When I was a kid, everybody peeled their own chestnuts. My mother would serve them in a big bowl and we all sat around the table peeling and eating. Since I was dealing with a chestnut amateur (my wife) I did the peeling before I served them. I peeled the outer skin as well as the inner skin (Picture above). It was not too difficult to remove these two layers of skins.

This was very good. The natural sweetness of the chestnuts was very nice with an almost starchy consistency. I told my wife that I did not remember when I last tasted boiled chestnuts.  She replied that she had nothing to remember since she never had boiled chestnuts and certainly nothing related to chestnuts that tasted this good. Surprisingly, the chestnuts went very well with the red we were drinking  (100% tempranillo from Spain), Bodegas Resalte de Penafiel Ribera del Duero Crianza 2005.  This is interesting pairing and we rather enjoyed it.

Chestnuts with somen noodle crust 栗のコッロケのいがぐり揚げ

Besides matsutake 松茸, chestnuts 栗 are a classic symbol of autumn. Every year, we get whatever remained of North American Chestnuts from California. Same as matsutake dishes, I almost exhausted what I can make from chestnuts but I came up with a variation of the chestnuts croquet.



This is same as the chestnut croquet but instead of bread crumbs, I used broken thin Japanese noodles or so-men 素麺. As you can see above, it resembles the spiky outer layer or "Iga" いが or 毬 of chestnuts (sort of). This is mostly for appearance rather than taste.



When you cut into it whole chestnuts appears.

To make it, (I am repeating the previous post).

Chestnuts: The best way to removed the hard outer skin is to do it while it is hot after boiling. I took one out at a time and keep the rest in the hot water in which the chestnuts were cooked. I removed the outer skin by cutting the bottom of the chestnut (mostly skin part) and then peeling off the outer skin or "onikawa" 鬼皮. The outer skin is easy to remove (except that the chestnut is very hot). The inner textured skin or "shibukawa" 渋皮” is more difficult to remove. Especially for Northern American chestnuts, the inner skin goes deep into the crevasses of the nut. Sometimes pulling up will release it or more often, the nuts break apart. We did about 20 chestnuts and 9 came out whole and other 11 were fragmented.

I placed the fragmented chestnuts (11) into a small food processor and pulsed it to break down the chestnuts and then added milk. I gradually added milk as I ran the processor until a chestnut paste is formed  (upper left and right below). I added a pinch of salt as well. The paste was stiff enough that the traces of the tines of a fork remained on the surface.

I moistened my hands and covered each whole chestnut with the chestnut paste (right lower).


For regular croquets, I dredged with flour, egg water and panko bread crumbs. For this preparation, instead of panko bread crumbs, I broke up the dried somen noodle in small segments (about1 inch or less) and coated the croquets. I just deep fried them in 350F oil for several minutes or until the somen noodles were golden brown.

Simmered Chestnuts and Chicken "Chikimarron" チキマロン鶏肉と栗の甘辛煮

I thought I had exhausted all my repertoire possible for dishes using chestnuts but then I encountered this recipe on line and decide to make it using what was left over after making "shibukawa-ni" 渋皮煮, "Chestnut croquettes" 栗のコロッケ and "Chestnut rice" 栗ご飯. This turned out to be a good dish and we had this as a sumptuous lunch over the weekend.



The name of the chicken chestnut dish I made is "Chiki-marron" チキマロン(Chiki-English for chicken and marron-French for chestnut). I used, cleaned chestnuts (both outer and inner skins removed as posted before). I started with whole/intact chestnuts (9 of them) but realized that unlike Japanese chestnuts they would not be intact after cooking because of the many deep crevasses characteristic of North American chestnuts.  I added additional 3 chestnuts that broke into several large chunks when I peeled them (#1).

I poured in 1 cup (about 200 ml) of "dashi" broth (I made it with kelp and bonito flakes), sugar (4 tbs), and sake (4 tbs). Once it came to the boil, I turned the flame down, skimmed off any scum from the surface and covered with a  "otoshi buta" 落とし蓋 . I simmered for 8 minutes (#2). I then added soy sauce (3 tbs) and simmered  for 10-15 minutes until the simmering liquid was reduced to less than half (#3). I added freshly deep fried chicken "kara-age" 鶏の唐揚げ (see below) and mixed and simmered for 1-2 minutes until the potato starch coating bloomed into gelatinous coating and absorbed the simmering liquid (#4).



For chicken Kara-age: I skinned and deboned chicken thighs and cut them into bites sized pieces. I made up all of them but used only two for this dish reserving the rest for future use. (Of course number of remaining pieces declined continuously because we started snacking on them as soon as I made them). My wife declare that I could stop right there the dish was great just as it was.

I made the Kara-age by using a small amount of soy sauce and grated ginger and massaged it. I then dredged in potato flour (katakuri-ko 片栗粉) and deep fried in 170F peanut oil for 5 minutes (or until the center of the meat is done and surface crispy) turning several times. I drained them on a rack for a few minutes then added kara-age chicken into the pot of chestnuts and sauce.  I cooked the mixture stirring constantly until the coating on the chicken absorbed the simmering liquid leaving the pieces with a glossy rich coating.

I had some frozen chestnut rice which I heated in the microwave. It revived very well and tasted almost like freshly made.



My wife likes to add a thin pat of sweet butter to her chestnut rice (which is not the traditional preparation but tastes good nonetheless). I also sprinkled on some  "Goma-shio" ごま塩 which is a mixture of black sesame and kosher salt (see below). This is a rather standard Japanese seasoning.



Although we love kara-age and we were a bit skeptical about this dish (put crispy chicken into liquid? Really?), this was quite good. The crispy coating transformed into an altogether different but very flavorful coating that went very well with the chestnuts. Most of the chestnuts crumbled a bit but were still very good. The combination of chestnut rice and this dish is also good and really enjoyed all the goodness of chestnuts.

Chestnut tempura 栗の天ぷら

We got North American chestnuts from Girolami farm this year and were very much impressed with how good they were and I ordered another 3 lbs. One of the difficulties in dealing with chestnuts especially the North American variety is removing the inner brown skin or "shibukawa" 渋皮. It appears that the shibukawa does not just cover the surface of the chestnuts but goes deep into the cleavage of the nuts making it extremely difficult to remove, and making the nuts taste bitter if it is not removed. I do not remember this characteristic in Japanese chestnuts. In any case, I solved this problem after few tries (see below).

After I found the way to remove the shibukawa fairly easily and completely, I saw the description of chestnut tempura. Although I have never had or made this, I decided to try it. The above is the result. It is excellent and the chestnut's sweetness and nice texture came through very well.

I also made shiitake mushroom tempura and served them with my usual green tea salt as seen above.

Now my method of removing the shibukawa inner skin: I first soaked the chestnuts in cold water for a few hours. I put the pot with chestnut in it on high flame until it started boiling, I turned it down to simmer. I cooked for 15-20 minutes and shut off the flame. I let it sit in the pot for 20 or so minutes. I scooped up several chestnuts at a time using a large slotted spoon and started removing the outer and inner skins. It was still rather hot but just cool enough that I could handle them. When I pulled on the shibukawa using a paring knife, to my surprise it came off very easily and with a little care, the shibukawa even came out from the cleavages as seen above. When the chestnuts got cold or dry and were too long out of the cooking water, it became more difficult to remove the shibukawa and the nuts tended to break when I tried. So, I worked 4-5 chestnuts at a time. In any case, I got really good at it and removed both outer and inner skins breaking only few chestnuts. I produced a good numbers of intact chestnuts with both skins completely removed this way.

The tempura batter is my usual; a mixture of potato starch and cake flour mixed with cold water. I  made a somehwat thick batter for this. I deep fried it in fresh peanut oil at 340F for 3-4 minutes.

This is surprisingly good.  The natural sweetness of chestnuts is really enhanced and nice combined with nice "hokuhoku*" ホクホク texture. 

*It is difficult to translate to English. This is to express the texture of starchy root vegetables such as boiled or grilled potato especially roasted sweet potato called "Ishi-yaki Imo".

Chestnut Soup 栗ときのこのスープ

We used to get fresh chestnuts from California every fall. The preparation, especially removing the inner brown membrane is time consuming and difficult. So we decided to try commercially prepared chestnuts sold either in a jar or a plastic pouch. As a test to see if the prepared chestnut tasted any different from the fresh, I made chestnut rice 栗ごはん with it. The final dish came out similar to using fresh chestnuts with the added advantage of much less effort of preparation required. (Since we posted  making chestnut rice with fresh chestnuts and this preparation tasted exactly the same we did not post it again.) But this exercise proved to us that fresh and commercially prepared chestnuts are interchangeable.  After making the rice we were left with one and half bags of prepared/roasted chestnuts (about 7-8 oz or about 200 grams.) My wife came up with this chestnut soup recipe which she found on-line. Again I had to modify the recipe because of the ingredients we had. The original calls for dried porcini and fresh button mushrooms but I only had fresh shiitake mushrooms.

Ingredients
5-6 fresh shiitake mushrooms, stems removed and caps sliced.
2 tbs. unsalted butter and 2 tbs. olive oil
1 large leek, white and tender green parts only, finely chopped
1 carrot, thinly sliced
2 celery stalks finely chopped
1 teaspoon minced rosemary (from our herb garden)
7 oz. (200 grams) peeled roasted vacuum-packed chestnuts (see picture below)
3 cups chicken stock
Salt
Freshly ground pepper

For garnish
1 tbs each of olive oil and unsalted butter
5-6 fresh shiitake mushrooms, stem removed and caps thinly sliced
Salt and pepper to taste
Fresh rosemary, finely chopped up

Directions
In a saucepan on medium heat, add the olive oil and butter. Add the sliced shiitake mushrooms, leeks, carrot, celery and rosemary and cook, stirring occasionally, until the vegetables are cooked; about 15 minutes. Add the chestnuts and stock, season with salt and pepper. Bring the soup to a boil and simmer over low heat for 30 minutes. Using an immersion blender, puree the soup until smooth.

For garnish
In a frying pan, heat the oil and butter. Add the sliced shiitake mushrooms, cook over moderately high heat until lightly browned (6 minutes). Season with salt and pepper. I served the soup warm and garnished with the sautéed shiitake and the chopped rosemary.

This is an excellent soup/potage. The chestnuts and leeks imparted a nice sweetness and distinctive chestnut flavor. Although the original recipe calls for heavy cream, I served this warm without any cream. It really didn’t need it. We had this as a lunch with slices of my home baked baguette. I am sure certain chestnut dishes cannot be made using these kinds of prepared chestnuts but I will try to use them in more of our favorite chestnut dishes

Chestnut buns 栗入り全粒小麦 バン

Since I have exhausted my collection of chestnut recipes over the past several years, my wife came to the rescue. She made chestnut buns. She ended up using her favorite whole wheat buttermilk bun recipe and added chestnuts from North American Chestnuts which I prepared.



We served this with my chestnuts in syrup and pats of butter.

 
The bread recipe came from Laurel's Kitchen: Bread Book.

Ingredients:
2tsp active dry yeast
1/2cup warm water
3/4cup very hot water
1/4 honey
1 1/4 buttermilk
5 1/2 whole wheat flour
2tsp salt
4tbs butter
1 to 2 cups chopped up chestnuts in fairly large chunks

Instructions:

Bloom the yeast in the 1/2 cup warm water. Mix the hot water, salt, honey and buttermilk. It should be just slightly warm. Put 4 cups of wheat flour into the bowl of the mixer. Add the liquid ingredients to the flour and continue mixing. Add additional flour until the dough reaches a soft but not sticky consistency. For rolls the dough should be fairly soft. Once the right consistency is reached, knead for 7 minutes. Then an additional 3 minutes first adding the butter a tablespoon at a time until incorporated then the chestnut pieces. If the mixer can't handle the chestnut pieces knead the last part by hand.



Form the dough into a ball and put into a bowl that has a little vegetable oil on the bottom to coat the ball so it doesn't dry out as it rises. Rise in a warm place until double. Deflate and let rise again. The second rising will take 1/2 the time. When it has doubled again deflate and form into individual buns. (To get buns of equal size I weigh the dough--3 1/8 ounces makes the size shown here). Put them in a heavily buttered baking dish. (The butter in the dish makes the crust nice and crunchy). Cook at 400 degrees for about 20 minutes (check them after 15 minutes).



Although this is a whole wheat bread, it is very soft and moist and, by far, our favorite whole wheat bun. The addition of chestnuts was very nice but in retrospect, we should have put in larger pieces and more of them. (Initially we were concerned that the chestnuts might end up fairly hard and in a large size would not have a pleasant mouth feel but it turns out they absorbed into the dough and were quite soft). Since preparing chestnuts is a lot of work, next time we may try making this recipe with prepared chestnuts in a jar (from Europe especially France).

Chestnut kakiage 栗のかき揚げ

One more dish made from North American chestnuts. This time I made “Kakiage” かき揚げ with onions and chestnuts.

Chestnuts: I prepared the chestnuts the same way as before. In brief, I boiled them and removed the outer and inner skins while they were still hot. For kakiage, you can use fragmented chestnuts.
Onion: Since I did not have any other vegetables such as carrot or gobou (burdock root), I just used sliced onion (halved first and then thinly sliced. The amount is totally arbitrary. You could add other items.
Batter: I lightly salted the sliced onion first and then sprinkled on cake flour and let it sit for 30 minutes so that the moisture from the onion came out.  To make this kakiage a bit richer I added one egg yolk (optional) and more cake flour and cold water and mixed. I tried to make a rather thin tempura batter.

In a deep frying pan, I added fresh vegetable oil and heated it to 350F on medium flame. When the oil was hot, I placed a flat disk of onion and chestnuts mixture using a slotted spoon (below). To make kakiage crispy, I fried it longer than I would usually fry tempura (5 minutes) and turned them over and kept frying for another 4-5 minutes until the edges of the onion were brown and crispy.

This is a good autumnal dish. The sweetness of the onion and chestnuts enhance each other with different textures. As usual, I served this with green tea salt and wedges of lemon.

Chestnuts in syrup and sweet potato with green tea お茶請け

The North American chestnuts we got this year were not as good as usual. They were kind of dry and chalky. We made our usual chestnut rice  栗ご飯 using the fragmented ones and made "kanro-ni" 栗の甘露煮 or chestnuts simmered in syrup. Since I also made "sweet" Japanese sweet potato, we had both as a snack with green tea which is called "Ocha-uke" 御茶請け.

The tea was sold by Hibikian 響庵 and came from Uji 宇治 . With green tea, something sweet goes well. Although both the chestnut and sweet potato are not "sweet tea cake", they are sweet enough to be "ocha-uke".

As before I boiled the chestnuts after soaking them for a few hours in water. I removed the outer and inner skins while they were hot. I simmered the peeled chestnuts in a simple syrup (equal amounts of water and sugar) for 30 minutes and cooled in the syrup.

Once in a syrup, the chestnuts will last for a while in the refrigerator. As I said, this year's batch was not the best but still, the chestnuts brought an autumn taste.

Chestnuts 北米産の栗

In mid September, we finally got a shipment of North American Chestnuts from Girolami farm.　I have already exhausted my repertoire of chestnut recipes but one post per year is warranted to commemorate the chestnut season.  This year, I made only a few dishes. The first one was chestnut rice 栗ご飯.  I used regular Japanese rice instead of sweet rice this time. As before, I made it in the "Kamado san" かまどさん donabe rice cooker.

North American chestnuts have many creases and when mixed tend to crumble into smaller pieces. I seasoned the rice with a mixture of black sesame seeds and kosher salt "Goma shio" ごま塩.

Since it was Sunday, we had some small dishes (which I do not remember) and the chestnut rice was the ending or "shime" dish. I usually barbecue some kind of meat mostly for sandwiches the next week. This time we cooked pork roast.

Since we were already rather full, we had a few slices of pork with cucumber onion salad with Greek yogurt dressing.

Here are all three items lined up. I was a pretty good combination. 

This is just a composite picture of this year's chestnuts. They are nice large, fresh chestnuts (much better than imported uncooked chestnuts from Europe).

I've finally gotten the hang of peeling these type of chestnuts. I first soak them in cold water for several hours and then boil them for 30 minutes. I take several at a time and start peeling them while they are still hot. The outer skin is easy to peel but the inner skin requires some effort. In any case, I peeled quite few of them in no time.

Chestnut croquettes 栗のコロッケ

This looks like "Menchi-katsu" メンチカツ but this is made completely with chestnuts, no meat or anything else is involved. After I got the second batch of North American chestnuts, I looked for chestnut recipes and found this chestnut croquettes recipe.

Here, are the cut surfaces. 

I only made three but to make three I needed 5 chestnuts for the batter (#1). I broke up boiled and cleaned chestnuts (5) and put them into a small bowl food processor. I added milk gradually white running the processor until a nice consistency of the batter was reached (#2). Actually, I overdid the milk so I added a small amount of potato starch to adjust the consistency. I then encased the three chestnuts with the batter (#3) and then rolled them in Japanese Panko crumbs (#4). I skipped the usual steps of dredging in flour and egg water steps since I did not feel they were needed. I let them sit for few minutes so that the panko adhered better to the nuts (#5) and deep dried them in 340F peanut oil on medium flame (#6) for several minutes.

This is really good. Chestnut encased in chestnut batter is a great combination. We really enjoyed the sweetness of chestnuts and the levels of texture ranging from the interior nut, through the batter surrounding it, topped with the crunch of the outer layer. I liked the chestnut tempura and this croquette equally well but my wife said she definitely like the croquette better. She said the croquette really had substance and could be served as the "meat" part of a meal. She also said she now realizes chestnuts are indeed "real" food you can enjoy.

Lunch and dessert on New Year Day 4

We had a lunch comprised mostly of items I made for the New Year (the red and white fish cakes are store bought and I did not realize this one has the letter "Kotobuki" 寿 on every cut surface (no doubt by co-extrusion process of white and  red colored kamaboko ingredients). I rather prefer the simple red and white ones. In any case, the main dish here is from the osechi box. It is a cylindrical sushi made from sushi rice, wrapped with buri 鰤 (grown-up yellow tail) and thin slices of white radish called "Buri kabura zushi" 鰤かぶら寿司.

Here is a close up. This is a type of sushi called "Bo-zushi" 棒鮨. First sushi rice is formed in the shape of "bo" 棒 or  "rod/cylinder) and then the upper side of the cylinder is wrapped with a thin filet of vinegared fish. In this particular dish, it was wrapped with  vinegared "buri" or grown yellow tail and then thinly sliced large white radish. This appears to be a New Year dish famous in Toyama 富山. I slightly warmed it up in the microwave oven to bring the sushi rice back to its original texture. It is important to "take the chill off" of the rice but not cook the fish or radish (I used increments of 10 seconds of microwaving to control the process).

As a dessert, we had chestnut "shibukawa-ni" 栗の渋皮煮, sweet yam and chestnuts 栗きんとん and black beans in syrup 黒豆. All these are traditional new year dishes but they are rather sweet and this is the best way to enjoy, at least, for us. We had this "Fukamushi Shin cha" of the last year season from Uji Hibiki-an 深蒸し新茶、宇治　響庵.

Some time ago when we are dining at Sushi Taro Omakase, our conversation with Chef Kitayama went to North American Chestnuts. As I  posted before, surviving (after chestnuts blight of 1940s) North American chestnuts have deep crevices and it is difficult to remove inner brown skin or "sibukawa" 渋皮 without breaking the chestnut apart. We asked Chef Kitayama how he handles this problem. He said he had to peel so many chestnuts and the perfect ones were set aside for dishes which requires whole chestnuts (such as shibukawa-ni) and the rest were used for other dishes (such as kuri-kinton).

Last year we also got a few sets of new tea cups from Hibiki-An. This is out favorite among them. It has a little turtle figure climbing up one side.

This was a quite filling lunch and nice dessert with wonderful green tea. Among the few green tea (sencha 煎茶) we tried from Hibiki-An, we like this tea the best so far.