The turning back of the clocks marks, in a certain sense, a change in culinary seasons. Now begins the long, slow slide towards Christmas. In the Viennese Konditorei, with the shortening of the days comes the ingredients that will see us through the winter: apples, poppy seeds, jams and preserves, and, above all, chestnuts. In part because they're harvested sometime between mid-September and November and in part because they stand up rather well to preservation, there is through such treats as the marron glacé -- the French candied, sugared, and glazed chestnut -- and the rather camp dessert Mont Blanc made from pureed chestnuts (oft found in cans) an inherent occasion between wintertime and chestnuts. While its largely-inedible outer shell can be ground down to make chestnut flour, it is the fruit contained within that chefs treasure. The chestnut's filling becoming sweet, tender, and nutty upon roasting, lending itself well to both sweet and savoury dishes.
The chestnut fruit, which the Austrians call Maroni (taking their cue from the Italians), is used in Vienna to make, among other things, Maronireis (sometimes called Kastanienreis. Kastanien is at once the German word for chestnut and, in Austria, the term used to designate the whole chestnut, as opposed to Maroni, a word that solely refers to the fruit). Maronireis is far from unique to Vienna. In Hungary, you'll find something called gesztenyepüré; in Switzerland, the equally-descriptive moniker Vermicelles. (Indeed, the dessert may very well have originated in Italy, where a great many chestnuts are grown.) But the principle is the same. The chestnuts are blanched in boiling water, shelled, and then in a sense poached in a mixture of milk, cream, and sugar. Rum is added before the creamy chestnut swill is pureed to make something thick enough, once cooled, to be pushed through a potato ricer (or similar) in order to create the signature long strands of chestnut puree, the Maronireis. It is served most often simply with whipped cream and sometimes with vanilla ice cream.
