Sweet autumn starts with chestnuts, and this "hybrid" is the most unique way to enjoy chestnuts!

Author: Fluent

What is the strongest smell on the street these days? It’s the scent of osmanthus!

After the Cold Dew season, the sweet osmanthus finally begins to bloom, filling the noses of passers-by with its unique seasonal aroma. There is also another aroma, which is a mixture of maltose and the sweetness of starch, bringing a warm feeling across the cheeks, and from time to time you can hear a few crisp sounds of bursting, which is the aroma of chestnuts .

For gourmets, "putting on weight in autumn" is the greatest respect for autumn, and even ordinary braised pork has to be added with chestnuts in season. For many native Shanghainese, chestnuts have a special way to "eat" them. When they were young, they could only have the opportunity to taste them during festivals or birthdays throughout the year, which is the "top Western pastry" in Shanghai: chestnut cake .

Nowadays, chestnut cakes are mostly made of chiffon cake base with rich chestnut paste, piled high and thick, which is more like the French dessert Mont Blanc. As a "Shanghai-style Western pastry", there are many different opinions about which master chef came up with the idea of ​​chestnut cake, but everyone knows that chestnut cake was "born" because of the shortage of materials, and Western pastry chefs "settled for the second best" and "accidentally" developed it.

In the 1950s, China was very short of raw materials for Western pastries such as butter and cream, and low-gluten flour, which was necessary for making cakes, was very rare. In order to let everyone eat delicious cakes and also make Western pastries with Chinese characteristics, Western pastry chefs came up with a method of using local ingredients , chestnut paste, to replace low-gluten flour . Chestnuts are boiled thoroughly, added with sugar and mashed into a paste, and the dense chestnut paste becomes a cake base with a richer taste. The proportion of low-gluten flour cake base in the Shanghai-style chestnut cake we eat today is still very small.

In my memory, chestnut cake is not a delicacy that can be easily eaten. You have to get full marks in the final exam to have a chance to eat it. But the soft and dense texture and sweet taste really make people miss it constantly.

It is a bit difficult to make chestnut cake at home. I recommend a recipe for chestnut chiffon cake , which is relatively simple among Western pastries. Friends who are interested can try it.