Description:

In the Natisone valleys you can find vast and lush forests of castagno.Il chestnut is a plant belonging to the same family as the oak and beech, native to West Africa, Southern Europe and North Africa. Its appearance is, as in most of the Angiospermae (flowering plants) arboreal, with broad rounded and branched stem foliage, divided into big branches which are divided in turn in two by two, starting from a certain altezza.E ' a typically sub-mountain plant, but only bears fruit in Mediterranean climates. In our region we prefer hilly areas of the east, where the deep and flysch soils guarantee a particularly suitable substrate. On the contrary it does not like the limestone and is therefore very rare or absent in areas with limestone bedrock and Dolomite. come to maturity is presented as a majestic tree up to 30 m. In Friuli the plant chestnut has suffered a gradual decline, both for the abandonment of the countryside and the economic activities related to the collection, storage and sale of the fruit, both for the presence of a serious disease of the wood: the chestnut blight or ink disease of chestnut, that some years ago it seemed even jeopardize its very survival. Currently the situation has improved, although the disease is still present. It seems that the new chestnut populations have adapted to better withstand the infection.

Uses:

In the Natisone valleys you can find vast and lush forests of chestnut castagno.La playback can be done by seed or by grafting and has been favored by man. In fact, the chestnut is an excellent food. By grinding the seeds can be obtained a composition similar to that of maize flour and rice, low in fat and rich in carbohydrates, in addition to being a good source of potassium, magnesium, iron and manganese. The flour is still used today to prepare cakes and torte.L'uso however, is not the only food chestnut. The bark has been used as an astringent, the leaves in infusion were used as painkillers and sedatives for convulsive coughs, and generally for respiratory disorders, given that they possess a certain bacteriostatic activity. Finally the wood is used as industrial timber. Once the dry leaves were used as padding of materassi.La variety grown best known is the so called chestnut brown, prized for its taste and size of the fruit. The local variety, whose organoleptic characteristics are often enhanced, although not always to right, are reduced in size, with little pulp, which is equipped with a resistant film and difficult to return to agriculture togliere.Il inserted in ' environment and not limited to a few species commercially cultivated, it leads to a better diet and varied where, certainly, you can not neglect this noble and useful plant.