Chestnut spelt salad
Perfect autumn flavors with this delicious and simple spelt salad with chestnuts, pomegranates, apple and smoked ham. Seasonal perfection!
Spelt salad with chestnut
When we were kids autumn was always an exciting time. We would go on foraging trips to find acorns, chestnuts and beech nuts. We would use the acorns and chestnuts to make little stick animals where we would use toothpicks to stick into the nuts to create arms and legs or whatever other weird creation we would come up with. The beech nuts we would eat. I haven’t eaten one in forever!!
The chestnuts we would find were mostly the kind you couldn’t eat. What we would call the wild chestnuts and then we had the ‘sweet chestnuts’ or ‘tamme kastanje’ (in Dutch) which you could eat.
We would always just eat them raw, peeling them before we went home, checking for those little bugs and then popping them into our eager mouths. Same with the beech nuts.
Acorns we would try and find as much as we could also when I was visiting my friend. Her parents had a big farm and the pigs loved to get acorns, so we found those by the bucket as the street opposite their farm was lined with big oaks.
We never did anything else with chestnuts or beech nuts. I’m not sure you can cook with beech nuts but I’m pretty sure by now that chestnuts are great to cook with. I brought home chestnut flour when I was in Italy and pretty soon you’ll find a fabulous cake recipe featuring that same flour, but other than that my experience with chestnuts was limited to our turkey stuffing adventure from last year. ( I can still feel my fingers from peeling all those hot chestnuts!)
It’s also not an ingredient that you find at every shop in town, so when I saw some last week I just had to get it. I used the chestnuts two ways; first in this delicious salad and later that same day for dinner in a mushroom risotto.
The good news is that you can buy ready cooked chestnuts that are vacuum sealed and so are easy to keep in stock. I love using them, so glad that is an option and I do not have to peel all of them myself. Anyway, over to this chestnut spelt salad.
Making the chestnut spelt salad
For making the chestnut salad you start by taking a large bowl and crumbling the cooked chestnuts in it. Chopping with a knife is also a good option. I then heat a skillet on medium heat and bake the chestnuts until they are golden brown. Leave to drain on kitchen towel and place back into the bowl.
The spelt (or substitute for farro) needs to be cooked. Once drained add to the bowl along with the pomegranate arils and the apple cubes. Mix it well and continue with making the dressing.
Making the dressing
For the dressing I used red wine vinegar, extra virgin olive oil, hazelnut oil and a bit of dijon mustard. Mix it through and add sea salt and black pepper to your taste. You can also add a bit of lemon juice if it needs a bit of freshness. The sweetness of the chestnuts usually doesn’t require anything like honey or maple syrup to be added to the dressing but you can definitely do that if you want to.
Additions and variations
I like to serve the chestnut spelt salad with mixed salad leaves and some slices of smoked ham. That is totally optional and if you want to keep the salad vegetarian leave out the meat. Not everyone is a fan of fruit in their salad but I would highly recommend adding both the apple and the pomegranate as that is a crucial part of this autumn salad.
Another good addition would be to add some roasted pine nuts or some sliced red onion to the salad. You could pickle the onion in a little bit of sherry vinegar to soften the taste if you’re not a fan of raw onions (I know I’m not!)
If you have any chestnuts left over they are also perfect with Brussels Sprouts, roasted from the oven! If you like spelt in a salad? try this spelt salad with beetroot and pomegranate
Chestnut spelt salad
Ingredients
- 50 gr chestnuts cooked and peeled
- 75 gr spelt
- 75 gr pomegranate arils
- 3/4 apple and eat the other 1/4..:
- 2 slices smoked raw ham I used black forest ham
- Salad leaves of your choice about a handful
- chives
Dressing
- 2,5 tbsp red wine vinegar
- 2 tbsp hazelnut oil
- 2 tbsp olive oil
- 2 tsp Dijon mustard
- salt
- pepper
- Chop or crumble the chestnuts and quickly bake them in a frying pan with olive oil until golden. Leave to drain on kitchen paper. Cook your spelt according to package instructions, drain and leave to cool.
- Peel and chop your apple into cubes. I had a small apple and used about 3/4 of the apple.
- Tear your ham in strips. Cut the chives into small bits.
- Make the dressing by combining the dressing ingredients and stir until combined. Taste and add salt and peper where needed.
- Assemble the salad by putting all ingredients in a bowl and stirring them through. Put some dressing through the salad and serve extra on the side
Nutrition Information per portion
Disclaimer
The nutritional values above are calculated per portion. The details are based on standard nutritional tables and do not constitute a professional nutritional advice.
