Before I knew it, my fingers were completely black, but that didn’t stop me from peeling back the burnt shells from the chestnuts to reveal their tender and steamy inside.  I had never eating chestnuts in such a way – straight from a roaring fire, tended by a retired winemaker and his sommelier grandson.  There is certainly an art to roasting chestnuts, but unfortunately the old tradition of roasting chestnuts or châtaignes on an open fire is slowly being lost in France to more conventional methods.  But here, in the small village of Chitenay in the Loire Valley, the tradition is being passed onto current generations who seem to understand the symbolic importance of such traditions.  The tradition of roasting chestnuts is a celebration of completing the fall grape harvest or vendanges.

The most important part of this tradition (perhaps even more important than the chestnuts themselves) is to drink bernache.  Bernache is partially fermented must, or rather it’s a drink that is in-between grape juice and wine.  The grape juice has only been allowed to ferment for a few days, meaning that it is very sweet, with a slight yeast taste, and mild effervescence.  Served chilled, it is a great compliment to the extremely hot chestnuts.  Both the chestnuts and the bernache come directly from the region.  The grapes are picked and pressed by the winemakers of Mont-près-Chambord, and the chestnuts themselves are gathered by hand from the surrounding forests.  Even the fire is made from vine branches that are gathered from the vineyards.

The chestnuts are then roasted directly on the flames in an iron pan with holes in the bottom and a long handle.  The skins quickly turned into charcoal, but the insides remained tender and sweet.  It takes less then five minutes for them to cook on the fire before being transferred to a metal pot, covered with a tea-towel and the lid, where they finish steaming in their own heat.

More important than the food or the drink, however, is the act of coming together as a family and a village.  By then end of the night, the long table in the middle of the room was covered with burnt chestnuts shells and drops of bernache that splashed over the rims of the glasses as cheers were being said for another successful harvest.

23 Oct This entry was published on October 23, 2009 at 12:57 am. It’s filed under Wine Pairings and tagged Bernache, Chestnuts, Chitenay, Harvest, Loire Valley, Mont-près-Chambord, Vendanges. Bookmark the permalink. Follow any comments here with the RSS feed for this post.