Castañes
Castañes (singular Castaña) is the Asturian word for the nuts of the European Chestnut tree (Castanea sativa).
The Tree
European chestnut is a one of the largest species of chestnut trees with a trunk topping out around 7 feet in diameter and rising to about 95 feet high at maturity. It has a pyramidal-rounded to broad-columnar form, is a native of southern Europe, and is often found in nature in mountainous woods. The fruit of the European chestnut is edible, but it is not commercially grown in the United State due to its susceptibility to chestnut blight. The genus name comes from the Latin for the town of Castania in Thessaly where the trees reportedly grew in abundance. The species name comes from the Latin word sativa meaning sown or cultivated by humans (as opposed to wild).
Chestnuts have been cultivated from this tree for human consumption since ancient times. Today this species is grown throughout much of Europe, northern Africa and southwestern Asia. Growth is widespread in Great Britain where this tree was first introduced during the Roman occupation. Chestnut blight appears to be much less aggressive in the cool and wet summer conditions in many parts of Europe than it is in the eastern United States; thus, the vast majority of chestnuts consumed as food in the United States are imported from European chestnut cultivars/hybrids commercially grown in Europe (most from Italy).
European chestnut grows well in most soils (sandy, loamy, and clay) including nutritionally poor soil, but prefers well-drained, mildly acid and neutral soils. It prefers full sun, dry or moist soil and can tolerate drought and maritime exposure.
The Asturian peasant of the middle ages was familiar with some fifty-odd localized varieties of the Chestnut and have a rich vocabulary for describing their size, growth, nut production, and wood qualities.[1][2]
The Nut
The importance of the chestnut fruit itself in Asturias cannot be overstated. Historically, it provided the bulk of the nutrition during winter months to a vast swath of the Asturian peasantry. Indeed, before the potato arrived from the Americas, it was the winter foodstuff throughout Asturias.[3] The nuts were used in every conceivable way. They were, of course, roasted in the skin. It that case they were designated castañes amagüestos, and the modern celebration of Amagüestu is an echo of this older practice.
They were also cooked in soups, as in the Pote de Castañes that precedes the current Pote Asturiano - potato replacing chestnut in the second. More were dried (Called mayuques) and used throughout the cold months as one would dried beans now.[4]
- ↑ Martínez, Jesús Neira. Diccionario de los bables de Asturias. Principado de Asturias, Instituto de Estudios Asturianos (I.D.E.A.), 1989. - See entries for castaña and óriciu, as well as individual cultivar names such as crespa, marniega, and others
- ↑ Arias, Xosé Lluis García. Diccionario general de la lengua asturiana: Castellano - asturiano. Editorial Prensa Asturiana, 2002.
- ↑ López, Pascual Pastor y. Memoria geoagrícola de Asturias. Auseva, 1989.
- ↑ Méndez Riestra, Eduardo. Diccionario de cocina y gastronomía de Asturias. pp 154. 1st ed., Trea, 2017.
