When Nat King Cole first crooned the opening line of “The Christmas Song” — “Chestnuts roasting on an open fire” — it’s quite possible he was among the last generation to have an authentic American chestnut. The ubiquity of the song and the association of chestnuts with the winter holiday season might lead one to believe that they’re as American as apple pie, but that simply isn’t the case, because the American chestnut is functionally extinct.
Once one of America’s most prolific tree crops, this hearty tree fell victim to blight in the late 1800s. By the late 1930s, three to four billion trees had succumbed and perished. Where small pockets of chestnut trees have survived across the Eastern United States, the saplings bloom and grow but, inevitably, the blight will attack and down they go again.
However, according to the American Chestnut Foundation, the root infra-structure of the tree hasn’t been totally eradicated, hence the “functional” extinction.
“The American chestnut used to be certainly in the top three most important trees of the forest of the eastern seaboard,” says Steven Rogstad, a biology professor and research scientist at the University of Cincinnati. Rogstad and his research team have conducted multi-year studies aimed at examining the American chestnut’s genetic diversity and modeling the potential reintroduction of a blight-resistant strand back into the American ecology.
He says there are about seven different chestnut species in the world. Predominant is the Chinese chestnut, which, coincidentally, is the carrier of the blight.
You can buy Chinese chestnuts at Kroger or even the CAM International Market on Reading Road, but the chestnuts at Madison’s in Findlay Market are imported from Italy, says Bryan Madison, the grocery store’s proprietor.
He says people buy them around Thanksgiving to roast to use in dishes like stuffing, and then he and his family continue to roast them at Findlay Market through the New Year.
“My son has all the equipment, brings it down and some of the younger grandchildren will come down with him and they’ll roast, and we do that out in front of our store,” Madison says. “If you go to New York, they’ll roast them there on the street. I think we’re the only ones that roast chestnuts here in Cincinnati.”
Perhaps some of the associative quality of chestnuts and holidays can be attributed to their ripening season, which coincides with the Thanksgiving through Christmas time period. A quick Pinterest search will yield a number of ways to cook with chestnuts, from including them in the aforementioned stuffing to chestnut soups and chocolate chestnut tortes.
This year, Madison’s teenage grand-daughters, Ellie and Julia Madison, are in charge of the roasting. The pair has been doing it for about five cumulative years, and they’ve got the process down to a science.
“Most nuts are flat on the bottom and round on top, and what you want to do is score from one side to the other on the round end and then put them in one of those little campfire shakers and just keep shaking them and shaking them,” Ellie says.
“They’ll split open a little bit and you’ll see the nut inside start turning this really beautiful, like, golden color and then it starts to look like it’s almost getting kind of moist and shiny and that’s when they’re done. And if you did it properly and scored it right, you can just pop both sides of the shell off.”
This is what our pal Nat was singing about, except the open fire at Madison’s is actually a propane burner. The girls will roast the nuts all morning, with “The Christmas Song” playing on repeat, selling red paper cones filled with chestnuts to marketgoers for $3.
For the uninitiated, the girls say chestnuts taste similar to sweet potatoes. Not actual orange sweet potatoes or yams, but rather a golden potato with a hint of sweetness. Oh, and they’re meaty.
“It’s almost like a sweet-savory,” “ Ellie says.
Julia agrees. “For people who’ve never had one, they have a texture of a potato. They’re pretty soft, they’re not chewy — they do kind of smell like meat.”
If you don’t have access to a camp-fire shaker or open flame, never fear. Rogstad’s alternate cooking method entails steaming them. He recommends puncturing the hard skin with a knife, putting them in a bowl with a little water, and microwaving for two or three minutes.
Or Ellie says you can also pan roast them. Her recipe calls for a hot oven warmed to 450 degrees, with scored chestnuts laid bare in a pan, preferably high-sided for optimal shaking return. Shaking is integral. Every couple of minutes, pull the pan out and shake the pan or move the nuts around with your hand, flipping them if shaking doesn’t cause enough motion.
If you’re mourning the loss of the American chestnut, take heart. Rogstad says his research coupled with the American Chestnut Foundation’s work breeding and developing blight-resistant strains of the tree could “hopefully recolonize our forest someday.”
In the meantime, Madison’s chestnuts are available during store hours. Keep an eye out for Ellie and Julia roasting them on an open propane tank on weekends.
Madison’s is located at 110 W. Elder St., Findlay Market, Over-the-Rhine.
This article appears in Nov 29 – Dec 6, 2017.
