shelidonDecember 6, 2023Leave a Comment

This is one of my favourite recipes, though I very rarely get to cook it because boiled chestnuts aren’t that easy to find, and I have no patience for boiling chestnuts myself.

Ingredients (serves 6 people):

For the filling:

• 500 grams of large chestnuts;
• 100 grams of ricotta (a soft cottage cheese will do);
• 100 grams of grated pecorino cheese (according to this site, you can replace it with Spenwood);
• 200 grams of pork meat;
• 3 eggs;
• a glass of milk;
• a pinch of black pepper;
• a pinch of marjoram;
• a pinch of thyme;
• a pinch of salt.

For the pastry:

• 400 grams of flour;
• 150 grams of butter;
• 2 eggs;
• water;
• a pinch of salt.

Recipe:

For the pastry:

Build a small volcano with the flour, break the eggs in the crater and work everything together with the salt. Pour water on it little by little until the dough is elastic and not too soft. It’s going to be sticky, so you need to dust your hands with more flour. Also, remember that the water needs to be cold and so do your hands, or else the eggs in the mixture start misbehaving and the dough — as we say in Italy — goes crazy.
Chop the butter into pieces and incorporate it in the mixture as well, work it into the dough until you no longer see the pieces but this requires for the mixture to warm a bit, so you’ll want to be quick about it. As soon as you’re satisfied, drop the dough in cellophane or in a cold cloth, and throw it into the fridge. Three hours is the optimum, but half an hour usually suffices.

For the filling:

Boil the chestnuts and peel them, if you’re brave, or buy them already boiled if you’re like me. Mash them with a potato masher or with a fork if you don’t have one, put the result into a bowl and mix it with the ricotta, the grated pecorino and the minced pork meat (yeah, I know, it’s raw: don’t worry). Work everything together with the eggs and the milk, sprinkle with pepper and herbs, and go take your dough out of the fridge.

Rub a pan with butter, split the dough in two and use the first half to line a baking pan. Pour the mixture in the dough, and then cover everything with the rest of it. You might want to pierce a some holes on the lid: there’ll be fat overflowing, and it’s better if you try to control it. If you want, you can also melt a curl of butter and use it to brush the surface of the dough.

The whole thing has to cook for around 50 minutes in a pre-heated oven that’s not too hot. Say 180°C.

What about chestnuts?

Romans used to call chestnuts Jupiter’s acorns (Iovis glandes), possibly because the stern appearance of this tree made it suitable to be a “cosmic tree”, a tree connected with the great father. The actual name of the plant however has a geographical connotation, and it’s said to come from the city of Castanis, in Ponto, where the Greeks thought this plant came from. In truth, the plant originates from Iran.

The Greeks weren’t particularly fond of chestnuts: Plinius the Elder found it very strange that the plant took so much pain to protect with thorns a fruit that’s really not that appealing, but recognises that they’re not so bad if you roast them, so possibly his mistake was trying to eat them raw. He also writes about chestnut flour, and says that you can make bread out of it, for the women’s fasting period. I have no idea what the heck he’s talking about.

Romans however appreciated them more: both Columella and Apicio mention them in their recipes, and the latter suggests their use to replace lentils. Marziale lists roasted chestnuts when he talks about a banquet offered by his friend Toranio, and makes a point to state they came from Naples.

Bonvesin de la Riva writes about chestnuts around 1288, and suggests using them in legumes soup with fava beans, to temper their bitterness. He also says they’re better than dates and, as much as I might love chestnuts, I can’t help but wonder what he’s been drinking.

One of the most famous chestnut trees in the Middle Ages was set in Sicily, on the slopes of the Etna volcano, and it was called “the chestnut of the hundred horses” because Giovanna “Giovannella” d’Aragona, Queen of Naples, took refuge under its branches with her own retinue after being surprised by a storm while travelling. Pascoli dedicated a poem to this tree.
The main trunk burned down in 1923, but some parts of it are still visible and the four secondary trunks measure around 50 meters. Yes, I said meters.

Throughout the Middle Ages, chestnuts have been considered food for the dead, possibly because of their nutritive and aesthetical similarities with fava beans and chickpeas which were already connected with the afterlife. They were food to be consumed during the Day of the Dead in both Venice and Piedmont, in the Valley of Aosta, in the Vienne region of France, and in some parts of Liguria.

In Ferrara, however, they had a different idea: during the feast of Saint Joseph, men gave their fiancées a romantic gift of hyacinth and a mistoca, a fritter made with chestnut flour which was a symbol for the end of winter.

It was only around the end of the XVI Century that roasted chestnuts became street food in Italy, as they still are today.