Calling all free-food-ers / foragers … It’s British nut season!
We wanted to feature the British nut this year, because nuts are such an important source of nutrients, especially for vegetarians and vegans, and because with some help they should be foragable and so available for free.
But it turns out to be quite difficult to find information about how to forage for nuts and what nuts we can expect to find in the British Isles. And it feels like a subject to be approached with caution, because foraging isn’t something you want to get wrong, and we aren’t even going to start making out like we’re experts. However, one source we’ve come across that we really like is the Wild Food School’s Urban Foraging Guide which is free to download.
What we do know is that this is definitely the season for beech “masts” (beech nuts), acorns (NOT to be eaten raw, but once the tannins are soaked out, they can be ground into flour), walnuts (still not easy to find British ones) and, our favourite option, the sweet chestnut.
Now the sweet chestnut is not to be confused with the horse chestnut or conker, which you can’t eat. You can tell the difference easily however – the casings are covered in hundreds of thin needle like spines, unlike the conker, which is cased in something much easier to pick up with big fleshy spines on. And inside a sweet chestnut case you’ll find two, three or four nuts nestled together, not just one. Sweet chestnuts are great roasted and eaten out of their shells, or the edible part can be pureed into a butter-substitute. And they’re gorgeous in chocolate brownies.
Before we move on to sharing some new nutty recipes with you, don’t forget that a brilliant way of improving the nutritional value of almost any meal is to sprinkle it with a mix of ground nuts and seeds. We always try to have a supply to hand of almonds, walnuts, hazelnuts, and pumpkin, seasame and sunflower seeds, which we grind using a mortar and pestle. We throw handfuls into porridge, yogurt, on top of ice cream and other desserts, or into casseroles, bakes, risottos and pasta sauces. Just brilliant for adding protein…
And now onto a really wonderful selection of recipes:
Classic Nut Roast
Peanut Butter Coleslaw
Maple-roasted Brussels with Hazelnuts
Sweet Chestnut Chocolate Brownies
Seasonal Veggie Casserole with Rice, Nuts and Mushrooms
Over to you…
Do share your own favourite ways of enjoying nuts, and let us know whether you have your own nut tree or a good local source of nuts you rely on.
Categories: seasonal eating
