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Soup

Chestnut Soup

A soup made by stewing peeled chestnuts in stock, mashing them through a sieve, and seasoning with mace, cayenne, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Eliza Acton · From a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg) · 9 ingredients
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Chestnut Soup

Why it works: Cream and mace are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,009 recipes. The science ↓

Chestnut Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the chestnuts

  1. Strip the outer rind from fine, sound Spanish chestnuts.

  2. Throw the chestnuts into a large pan of warm water until the water is too hot for the fingers to remain in it.

  3. Take the pan from the fire, lift out the chestnuts, and peel them quickly.

  4. Throw the peeled chestnuts into cold water as they are done.

  5. Wipe and weigh the chestnuts, taking three quarters of a pound for each quart of soup.

  6. Cover the chestnuts with good stock and stew them gently for upwards of three quarters of an hour, until they break when touched with a fork.

  7. Drain the chestnuts.

Make the soup

  1. Pound them smoothly, or bruise them to a mash with a strong spoon.

  2. Rub the mashed chestnuts through a fine sieve reversed.

  3. Mix the chestnut purée with the proper quantity of stock by slow degrees.

  4. Add sufficient mace, cayenne, and salt to season the soup.

  5. Stir the soup often until it boils.

  6. Add three quarters of a pint of rich cream, or less, to improve the soup.

  7. The stock the chestnuts were boiled in may be used for the soup when its sweetness is not objected to, or part of it may be added to the soup.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

57Calories
1 gProtein
6 gFat
1 gCarbs

Counts 3 of 4 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 3 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Cream1 tbsp (15ml) heavy51
Cayenne1 tsp (1.8g)6
Salt1 tsp (6g)0
Macenot in our table0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By Eliza Acton. Recipe from a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures. See the original page.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Cream + macetop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,009 recipes

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Chestnuts (in the method)
Form the body of the soup, becoming smooth and thick when mashed and sieved.
Cream
Adds richness and a smooth, silky texture to the finished soup.
Stock (in the method)
Thins the chestnut purée and carries the flavour of the soup.

The step that matters

Stewing the chestnuts until they break. Chestnuts must be fully softened so they mash and sieve into a smooth purée. Undercooked chestnuts stay grainy and leave lumps in the soup.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

More chestnut soup recipes

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