It’s chestnut season! Time to gather chestnuts and turn them into the divine deliciousness that is “crème de marrons”: a silky smooth sweetened chestnut puree. It’s like a delicate honey, but nutty, and autumny and comforting and it’s especially good when drizzled over a bowl of thick Greek yoghurt.

Ingredients:

Equal quantities of:

chestnuts

sugar

water

• First check your chestnuts, they should be firm and shiny and with a nice weight to them. Discard any chestnuts with a little hole in them. These have already been eaten inside by a little grub.
• Halve all chestnuts with a sharp knife.
• Boil them for about 10 minutes in a large pan with plenty of water, then drain.
• Start peeling as soon as you can handle it. You shouldn’t burn your fingers, but the colder they get, the harder it will be.

• Now weigh your peeled chestnuts and set aside.
• Weigh the same amount of sugar and heat it with the same amount of water in a saucepan until the sugar is completely dissolved.
• Now add the chestnuts and simmer them in the syrup for another 10 minutes.
• Now the mixture will have become light brown and a little thicker.
• Finally, blend everything until smooth. If you have a metal stick blender, you can do it straight away, but if you’re using a plastic blender you can let the mixture cool down a bit first.
• Pour the chestnut cream into a scrupulously clean glass jar, seal with a lid and put in the fridge to use whenever you feel like.