Chestnut Rice - Kuri Gohan

Served with a bowl of daikon in Yuzu and sesame oil dressing.

One of my co-workers gave me self collected sweet chestnuts from the Taunus mountains about 50 km north of here. I had the doggy poo bag sitting in the kitchen for 2 weeks. She is walking her 2 dogs where the chestnut trees grow. Some of the bags always on hand.

I put half of the loot into the oven yesterday. I cut them at the bottom side twice, that helped to open them a little. After 20 minutes at 180 C they were ready. I just had to wait until I could peel them without burning my fingers. It is important to peel them while they are still warm, that way you will get the inner skin off much better. It takes a while and makes a lot of mess with flying peel all over the place. While I was at it, I ate a couple of them just hot from the oven - delicious.

Chestnuts are eaten in many parts of the world and for thousands of years. They nourished the people in old times, the poor made flour out of them to bake some kind of bread or cake with them.

In Japan, chestnuts are found in Autumn in so many savoury and sweet dishes. You can find chestnut cream even in chocolate, KitKat and Mont Blanc, a dessert made with chestnut and cream.
I was looking for the savoury kind and found Kuri Gohan.

The rice is very tasty with a hint of sake and goes great with the flour texture of the chestnuts. I mixed up the rice a bit, I found that method the Internet. But just plain shortgrain rice does the job too.

recipe for 2:
1 rice cooker cup of shortgrain rice
1/4 rice cooker cup of pudding rice or Mochi rice
1/2 tsp salt
1 1/2 tbsp Mirin
1 1/2 tbsp Sake
1/4 tsp dashi powder

12 roasted or chooked chestnuts

1 tsp black sesame seeds
1 tsp soy sauce

Daikon radish
2 tsp Yuzu
2 tsp light Sesame oil
white pepper, salt and dried parsley

Wash the rice until the water runs clear. Let it sit in the colander for 15min.
Add it to the rice cooker and pour in 1,7 rice cooker cups of water, Mirin, Sake, dashi and salt.
After 10 min, add the chestnuts and finish the rice.

Serve it with black sesame seeds and a bit of soy sauce.