I have bought chestnuts for the past THREE Christmas seasons, and never used them... :-[ I don't know why I keep buying the damn things ($10/lb. is right!), but whenever I see them offered at my co-op around this time of year, I hear "Chestnuts roasting on an open fire..." start to play in my head, and I decide to be all old-fashioned & roast my own chestnuts... Except I never have.

I am NOT buying them this year.

I've tried roasting chestnuts once and some of them were ok, the rest were moldy.  I don't remember any of them being hard.  I think I poked holes in the shells (to minimize exploding) and baked for a while...and I didn't think they were good enough to be worth the expense and the trouble.

BP, if you're pretty sure it's a chestnut tree you could probably eat them (compare your tree to a picture of a chestnut tree, check if the leaves are the same, etc).  Start with just one or two nuts to make sure they're not poisonous or something.

Gee it seems like we've all had chestnut fail.  I'm not going to try them again.  Sigh.  The good ones were tasty but it seems like a waster to get only 6 or so good ones out of a whole pound.  :(

Easiest indeed over an open fire, if you have a fireguard sit them individually on that. Or in a metal pot (or coffee can) with holes punched in the bottom, over coals. Stir often. Yes, they explode, you expect that. We always jab them with a nut pick in a couple of places---same principle as baked potatoes.

I once made chestnut and onion soup. ONCE. Major fail. It was sweet and yet oniony. Gross.

do not overbake!!! when the chestnuts are still tender, take them out the oven.

and you should be fine  :)

Hello everybody,

I grew up in Europe and chestnuts are very common in Southern Europre. Chestnuts need to be dried in free air for a couple of weeks if you pick them up yourself. Beware of warms. If you buy them at the store because you cannot find them in the US, do not put them in a plastic bag, make sure they can breath. The best chestnut are roasted 400/450 degrees for 20 to 30 minutes. To avoid chestnut to explode, you need to cut a chunk out (usually a tenth of the chestnut at its base). This allow you to also check if there is no warm or if the chestnut is not rotten. The flesh is supposed to be white slightly yellow. There are 2 kinds of chestnuts. The chestnut per se is smaller, tastier and sweeter and is compartmenlized. The other type of chestnut (called something else in countries with a culinary history) is bigger and less sweet. If you cut the base of the chestnut as described above, you will see what I mean. Chestnut can either be roasted or boiled in water with or without herbs. The best chestnuts are from France or Italy (shoker!). Wholefood sell now some ready to eat in a package (gefen brand). They come from CHina, but are not that bad and very pratical as there is not preparation involved.

Hope this helps.

mine exploded as well. chestnut FAIL. i don' t know what the trick is but the fresh ones are like 10/lb here  :o

i found some chestnuts (at least they look like them) on the ground under what i assume to be some kind of chestnut tree. can i eat these? i was reading that there used to be a lot of trees in the US  but some kind of fungus killed them all so now chestnuts are imported. so does this mean they don't grow here and that this is a chestnut imposter tree?

sorry for thread stealing

Asian Market on Colvin -- $3.99/lbs.

Damn you! I was coming here to say that I saw them at an Asian Market for $3.99/lb

i collected a bunch of horse chestnuts from the trees when i was in sweden, thinking they were 'regular' chestnuts.  i roasted a pan full of them to discover at the first nibble that they are too disgusting to swallow, which was fortunate, as it turns out that horse chestnuts are toxic.

Please post when you hear back, tino_bambino; I have never had chestnuts but I want to make them this year!