Creamy Chestnut Apple Soup

Last night I made one of the most amazing soups I have ever tasted. It is creamy, comforting, delicious, seasonal, and festive. And the best part is that its extremely easy! 2 cups chestnuts, roasted, peeled 3 stalks celery chopped 1 apple, chopped 1/2 white onion, chopped 2 cups of chicken stock 1/4 cup heavy cream 1 tsp sage I started out with a container of chestnuts which I spread on a cutting board so that I could score an X in each one. Using a sharp knife to do this makes sure that when the chestnuts are roasted, the shells easily peel off.

Chestnuts are really beautiful to look and it even lovelier to eat! I placed the tray of scored chestnuts in the oven at 400 for 15 minutes. Once the oven was off, I waited a couple of minutes, then started peeling the shells off.

The come off fairly easily, and it helps to wear an oven mitt on one hand. If you have trouble, it is easy to just squeeze the shell a little to get it to crack a little. After the chestnuts were peeled and off to the side, I chopped the celery, onions, and apple and started them in a couple of teaspoons of sizzling olive oil.

After everything had softened, I added a knob of butter, the sage, and the chestnuts.

After a couple more minutes of cooking, I poured in the chicken stock. 

I brought the soup quickly up to a boil, then turned the heat off. After waiting for about 10 minutes for the mixture to cool, I poured it all into a blender. If you don’t wait for it to cool, you may end up with a soup explosion! Once you have blended the soup it should be very thick. At this point, the soup is ready to eat if you choose. I decided to return it to the pot to gently heat it and to slowly stir in the heavy cream.

The final product was velvety, nutty, slightly sweet with a hint of apple, and very rich. We each ate a small bowl and packed the rest for dinner the next night. I love the versatility of this recipe, which I found by piecing together elements from a variety of online recipes. It could easily be made vegetarian with vegetable stock and vegan by leaving the cream out. You could add more apples, carrots, leeks, or other vegetables. I made this while listening to Christmas music and enjoyed it with a glass of  Georges DuBoeuf Beaujolais Nouveau, a perfectly festive holiday combination 🙂 Tomorrow morning I hope to volunteer, and then I will be off to New Jersey for a few days. I can hardly wait!