May Memoir: Ca va? Stories from Rural Life in Southern France, Chapter 8: Chestnut Jam

Welcome to MaY MEMOIR!

Day 9 

For the entire month of May, I'll be sharing part of each chapter from my memoir, Ca va?  Stories from Rural Life in Southern France.

At times, I never know what to expect when I knock on Chantal’s door.  This time, I learned how to make chestnut jam.  It’s thick, and it is the most amazing and addictive jam I’ve ever eaten.

Chapter 8: Chestnut Jam                 

 One afternoon, I knock on Chantal’s door anticipating another French lesson.

“What are you doing?”  I ask looking at the basket full of chestnuts on the table.

“Making chestnut jam”, she replies while watching a pot of boiling water on the stove.

“I have never heard of that before”, I say.

“You have never heard of chestnut jam?”  She exclaims.  “It’s wonderful!  It’s the best jam there is, but it takes a long time.  I’ll show you how to make it!”  Chantal cries happily while pulling out a pair of rubber dish gloves for me.

“Put these on”, she says.  “The chestnuts are hot and you need them to protect your hands.”

I eagerly put on the gloves and watch.  Chantal tosses the chestnuts into the boiling water and hovers over the pot watching them closely.  After a few minutes, she pokes them with a fork, and announces, “They are ready.”

Thinking the process is over, I am a bit lost and wonder why I have on protective gloves, but then Chantal places the strained chestnuts on the table in front of us.

“We need to work while the chestnuts are hot”, she says handing me a knife.

“First, we take off the outer shell”, she explains. 

I watch Chantal as she grabs a hot chestnut and digs her knife into its outer shell, chipping away at it slowly.  I take my knife, pick up a chestnut, and mimic her actions.

“The shells are a bit slippery” she says.  “But it’s easier to take the shells off when they are hot.” 

“I see now why the need for the gloves.  I’m starting to feel the heat through the gloves.” I say, shaking my hand.

“Patience”, she says pointing to the large bowl of chestnuts in front of us.  “As I said, this is going to take some time.”

The process moves slowly, but eventually we get to the end of the bowl.  The table is full of wet newspapers scattered with shells and my hands are soar and slightly burned.

“I’m glad that’s over,” I say with a slight grin while taking off my gloves.  I look down and notice my fingertips are red and crinkly.

“That was the first layer”, she explains while taking all the de-shelled chestnuts and dumping them back into some boiling water.  “There is a second layer we need to remove, so we do the whole process again.”

“What?”  I ask as the grin falls off my face.

“That was the outer shell.  There is a second layer than needs to come off too.  If we don’t get them off, the jam will be bitter.”

Unenthusiastically, I wait for the chestnuts to boil again.  After a few minutes, Chantal, yet again, places the strained chestnuts on the table in front of us.

“This time, the shell is more like a thin peel, a bit like the pith of an orange”, she says taking one out and starting to work on it.

Another hour passes and we have finished the second round of peeling.  My arms are wet up to my elbows and I am wondering if it was a good idea to knock on the door earlier today.

 “We are done peeling”, Chantal says with a smile.  “Now we cook them to soften them and pass them through a food mill.”

Chantal cooks the chestnuts and spoons them into a food mill.  We take turns churning the mixture, and slowly, a paste emerges.  She then puts the paste into a pot with sugar, water, and vanilla beans and cooks it for several hours.  She hoovers over the mixture, watching as it comes to slow boil that bubbles heavy like lava.  She dips a spoon in and examines as it clings to the spoon.

“It’s ready,” she says and dips another spoon into it for me.  “Taste this.”

The jam is the color of brown sugar and slightly thicker than honey.  I bring the hot spoon to my lips and taste it; the jam is amazing.  I have never tasted anything like that before: slightly nutty, sweet, hints of vanilla, and a caramel like finish that lingers.  It is manna. 

I ended up eating a bowl of the jam by myself within the next hour.  The next weekend, Christophe and I went out gathering chestnuts so I could make more, but collecting chestnuts is not as easy as pickling apples.  The chestnuts are in thorny bogs, which when fallen upon, are quite painful.  Trust me.