Boiling Chestnuts

I know I told ya'll I was going to roast the chestnuts I foraged for in my 'hood... but since I didn't have a pan big enough to lay them all even & flat in the oven, I decided to try and just boil them in some spring water. (This project was NOT a fail either! It's SOooooo Delicious. YAY!)

ALL YOU NEED:

• chestnuts
• a knife
• water
• a pot

What I read and have been told numerous times is that chestnuts can explode while cooking. I've been told this same thing about sweet potatoes and never seen it happen... but I decided the chestnuts seem more like a bomb.

STEP ONE: Take a sharp knife and draw a lil' X on each chestnut to keep it from exploding. This also makes it way easy to peel open after they are done cooking!

STEP TWO: Dump all your X'ed chestnuts into boiling water. Let them boil for about 20 minutes.

STEP THREE: Peel open at the X and eat dat' yellow-ish nut on the inside. It's GOOD! Make sure you dont eat the funked out rotten gray ones (or at least I didn't cause they smell sour and bad).

It's so good, I ate them all at once. I couldnt stop!!! I felt like a f'en squirrel. :)

I have to go back to that tree and see if there's more...

xoxoxox

Chestnuts & Buckeyes, not the same nut!

Back in the day when I first became interested in foraging for food, I got really excited about all the "chestnuts" falling around my cabin. I collected massive basket fulls, and felt like I had struck gold in the yummy nut lotto! That is until my poor boyfriend at the time ate them.
He believed me that they were chestnuts and while I was asleep one night he boiled a bunch down and began peeling and eating them - he said they tasted bitter and sick but he ate about 10 of them anyway and got really bad stomach probs the next day.
The internet was not as saturated with info as it is now, but he decided to look up more about cooking chestnuts since his were so f'en gross and discovered he'd been eating poisonous buckeyes, otherwise known as "horse chestnuts" ( they are poisonous to horses).
Poor guy. He never was right after that. He never was right before that too though.
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So here are clear pictures for ya'll food foragers out there who might be curious about these nuts...
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This picture below is the big shiny HORSE CHESTNUT, or BUCKEYE. It is poisonous to people and to some animals too. DO NOT EAT THIS NUT!

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This next picture below is a real EDIBLE CHESTNUT! You can eat these, most people prepare them first by roasting or boiling. But HERE they say you can go ahead and eat them raw too. (I am gonna roast mine! mmmmm)

Xoxoxoxo

Chestnut Tree

I found this large chestnut tree over by the Haunted House down Willow Creek Road- I was super excited about finding it cause I like to collect chestnuts fresh off the tree (free food excites me)! I know it's not an American Chestnut, cause those almost went extinct back in the day...

"It is estimated that the total number of chestnut trees in eastern North America was over three billion, and that 25 percent of the trees in the Appalachian Mountains were American Chestnut.The American Chestnut is highly susceptible to chestnut blight, caused by an Asian bark fungus (Cryphonectria parasitica, formerly Endothia parasitica) accidentally introduced into North America on imported Asiatic chestnut trees. The number of large surviving American Chestnut trees over 60 cm (24 inches) in diameter within the tree's former range is probably fewer than 100."
Those green balls of spiky doom are what holds the yummy chestnut treasure - this tree looks as though it is going to drop more then I could ever eat. It's a very large tree with a wide reaching range of branches. They branch out so far I had to triple check that I was finding the right trunk they were growing from... below is a picture of what the bark looks like on a Asian Chestnut, so it will help ya identify the tree better when looking for it!
The leaves are rather large and glossy, with distinct lines, edges, and shape. The Asian variety seems to have very dark green leaves.
When the chestnuts are ready to eat, the green spiky balls turn dry & brown - then fall to the ground. These things are not soft or hairy- it's more of a porcupine type thing going on...or maybe a ball of hospital needles - so grab it lightly and slowly.
Generally the balls open up and the chestnuts fall out! (Thank Gawd!) Pictured below is an open spike ball from last year- cause they are not quite ready yet this season, chestnuts fall to the ground when it's cold out and you are gearing up to hear Christmas songs in every store.
(I don't have a pic of the chestnut itself here, but click on one of the cooking links below and you can see what it looks like.)

Here is how easy it is to prepare them : Chestnut Cooking Tips! Just cut some X's in the skin and roast in the oven or boil! You can make other recipes with them too...mmmm.
XoXO

Sometimes Ya Feel Like A Nut (Tree)

I like to try and start trees from seed - especially nut trees! In the bag here are some pine nuts...mmmm...that are getting too outdated to eat but might have some life in them to plant some pine trees from seed. The best way to do this is to get a a handful of (preferably organic) nuts still in their shell from a local grower at the grocery or farmers market, since that will make the chances of your tree lovin' your climate alot better (remember to double check that they are locally grown). Experimentation is cool too though- these pines nuts were grown in New Mexico, but I have still had them sprout little pine trees in flower pots where I dropped shells I was cracking to eat.
Just to make sure I have a goooooood chance of something coming up I took a big ole' handful of the pine nuts and put them all at different levels in the soil. Some are just patted down, some buried deep, some buried shallow- which is my attempt to imitate nature's way of dropping the seeds and then all kinds of junk happens to them after that. Growing up in New Orleans I use to watch the squirrels bury the pecans for the (not all that cold) winter - pretty deep in the ground, and that is when the strongest trees would grow up out the soil. Go Pine Nuts Go!
XoXo

Grow A Fruit or Nut Tree

I confess that I have a bit of a seed saving obsession. Everytime I find seeds inside my organic fruits and veggies I feel like I struck gold...possibly this is some deep biological farmer instinct, maybe it's in my DNA, or most likely it's from reading lots of self sustained farming books. I love growing trees from seeds I save from my fruit and nuts- this little proud guy pictured here is a apple tree! I have planted bunches of trees everywhere I lived, cherries, pecans, peaches and a variety of apples. It's totally organic & easy to do: When you eat an apple, just pop out the seed and stick it in some dirt, keep the dirt moist & thinly mulched...and wait for the joy of your tree seedling to pop out! If you want to try a peach seed, then soak the hard hull in some water for a day then crack open with a nutcracker and plant the almond shaped seed loosely under the dirt. For nut trees, just stick some nuts in their shell down in the dirt (pine nuts and pecans grow really easily).
These are my favorite to plant because I know they will be giving back and feeding people later on. :)