Chestnuts
Last month at our dinner at the farm, I had the pleasure of meeting Ann and Don Priebe. The couple live in a small cabin overlooking Lake Leelanau in the midst of a chestnut orchard of about 100 trees. Ann writes:
The owner is Corey Allen and he lives in Petoskey, so we have been watching over the orchard for him. He calls his orchard Lake View Orchard and is part of a Northern Michigan chestnut co-op. He had a wonderful season this year, the best ever, and we picked up and shipped about 800 pounds of chestnuts to the co-op at Michigan State. We are slowly learning all about raising chestnuts and find it fascinating. Corey let us keep some of the left overs and we sold them at Farm 651 and The Ugly Tomato. I'm also freezing some so we will have some to roast at Christmas time.
I went out to Farm 651 before they closed for the season to buy a bag, and now I'm narrowing down the options:
- Butternut Squash-Chestnut Soup with Balsamic Caramelized Pears - "It is labor intensive," Ann says, "but really worth the trouble."
- Butternut Squash, Black Bean and Chestnut Burgers, from Lukas Volger's new cookbook Veggie Burgers Every Which Way . I just got this cookbook, and the recipes look amazing. I could try any of them and probably be happy!
Now that the temperature has dipped and the snow is falling, I think the soup will win out!
Do you have a favorite way to prepare chestnuts?
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