In China, the chestnut is a symbol of good fortune and fertility. In European folklore, children are given a chestnut to place in their pocket to protect them from bad luck. In Catalonia families roast chestnuts on the last day of October to honor deceased relatives. On the feast day of St. Martin of Tours, people hand out roasted chestnuts to celebrate the end of the harvest, and in the book Howards End by E.M. Forster there is a tale about a chestnut tree where the teeth of a pig were embedded in the tree by the country folk in an attempt to cure toothaches by chewing bark from the tree.
The chestnut and the lore surrounding it have been part of human culture as far back as anyone can trace. One of the oldest foods known to be consumed by humans, the history of man’s relationship with chestnuts goes back to prehistoric times. Chestnuts were first cultivated as crops in Greece and China with numerous distinct varieties slowly making their way across the globe. Indigenous people in the Americas feasted on American chestnuts long before the arrival of Europeans. For hundreds of years the wood of the American chestnut was sought after for timber until a devastating chestnut blight in 1904 swept across America destroying most of the American chestnut trees. Today most chestnuts eaten in the United States come from Europe and Asia.
When writing about the taste of Victorians one is inevitably going to meet the great chestnut. In the United States the chestnut conjures up thoughts of Thanksgiving stuffing and Christmas memories with chestnuts roasting on an open fire, but in Europe the chestnut is much more than that. It is a part of everyday life.
As the child of European immigrants I’ve known chestnuts since childhood. I have memories of sitting at the kitchen table as a little boy helping my mother peel chestnuts, but I suspect that is not the case with most Americans. For them the chestnut is a somewhat exotic ingredient from the Old World that only shows up on holidays.
Chestnuts grow inside a furry or spiked pod depending on the variety. They are high in carbohydrates and low in fat and protein and are often used in place of potatoes in some cultures. They can be used in both savory and sweet dishes which accounts for their perennial popularity. Ever since I was introduced to marron glacés—a candied chestnut—as a young man I have sought the perfect marron glacés whenever I enter a European grocery store where they can be easily found,
It came as no surprise to me then that there were numerous representations of chestnut themed dining pieces for serving in European majolica.
I know that many cooks are put off by the difficulty in peeling chestnuts but today you can buy them already cooked, peeled and ready for use. You can even buy chestnut paste in a tube puréed and sweetened ready to use in desserts. Whichever way you choose to use them, there is a long history of the consumption of chestnuts behind this humble nut and numerous appropriate majolica dishes on which to serve them
