Roasted chestnuts

[pegkerr]

I stopped by the grocery store yesterday, and along the ingredients I bought for yesterday's disastrous dinner, I bought a few chestnuts. I roasted them under the broiler after dinner and offered them to the girls. Fiona tried one and rejected them (of course) but Delia was pleased by the taste and had several.

They reminded me so powerfully, as they always do, of being back in England, where I tasted them for the first time. I remember buying roast chestnuts from the vendors at the street corners, who would pull them out from steel drums where they roasted them and hand them to you in a paper cone. They kept the hands warm as you walked around that grand old city, and the taste was so warm, so welcome, so sweet and filling and perfect.

Tell me about a food that when you eat it brings back a powerful memory.

Edited to add: since people have asked: Roasting chestnuts is extremely easy. Just make a criss-cross cut on the flat side of the chestnut with the point of a sharp knife and then throw them on a broiler pan and put them under the broiler for five to ten minutes. Yum.

Comments

[amandageist.livejournal.com]

Do you peel them first before you roast them? How do you get the shell off at all? I spent hours trying to peel chestnuts for a chestnut stuffing, once--it was absolutely wonderful but I've never made it again, I hated dealing with the damned chestnuts and those horrible shells.

~Amanda

[pegkerr.livejournal.com]

No, I don't peel them before roasting them. When you make that criss-cross cut, the shells will curl a bit back from the cut as they roast, and then you can get your fingers underneath the curled up bit and leverage the shell off.