Chestnut rice or Kuri Gohan is a traditional Japanese fall rice recipe. This aromatic chestnut rice with black sesame and a pinch of salt is perfect for fall evenings.
Every fall I am thankful for all the new crops that the farmers cultivate and harvest. From rice, sweet potatoes, pumpkins, mushroom, to chestnut, fall season provides abundant foods for us to enjoy. This Japanese Chestnut Rice (Kuri Gohan 栗ご飯) is a perfect dish to appreciate the season.
Watch How To Make Chestnut Rice 栗ご飯の作り方
A traditional Japanese fall rice recipe, this aromatic chestnut rice with black sesame and a pinch of salt is perfect for fall evenings.
My father’s side of the family was from Niigata prefecture (新潟県) before they moved to Tokyo. Nigata is known throughout Japan as the home of Koshihikari rice, sworn by many to be the best in Japan. Every fall my family would receive new crop of rice from our family and friends in Niigata and I still remember how delicious the freshly milled rice was.
Earlier this year our friends at Far West Rice invited us to visit their rice field so that we can see how they transplant rice from green house to the field. This project was a very special experiment for Far West Rice too because for the very first time, they tried to grow rice the Japanese way. Typically in the US, the seeding is done by airplane dropping seeds into flooded fields. For the experiment,
- Far West Rice sprouted the rice seed in the greenhouse until they became seedlings.
- Once the seedlings reached a certain maturity in the greenhouse, they were then ready to be transplanted to the field.
- The seedling plants had to reach a point of maturity so they would be able to flourish and tolerate the conditions in the field.
Here are some photos and videos we captured on our trip.
When fall came, their special koshi rice was ready for harvest.
Here’s our friend Ted harvesting the stalks using the Japanese harvester (look how small this is compared to American harvester!).
Use Japanese Short Grain Rice for Chestnut Rice
Good Japanese rice has this beautiful pearly white shape. It is shiny, aromatic, and resilient when it’s cooked, and each grain of rice is perfectly fluffy and distinct. When you chew the grain, it has a slight sweetness and a wonderful bouncy texture.
Far West Rice will only polish and pack the rice when an order is placed so that the rice stays fresh and keeps the rice in optimal condition. Their rice is simply incomparable. A perfect bowl of heavenly good rice. And it goes so well with freshly harvested chestnuts.
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- 2 cups uncooked Japanese short grain rice
- ¼ cups sweet rice/glutinous rice (mochigome, see Notes)
- 1 Tbsp sake
- 1 tsp salt (kosher or sea salt; use half if using table salt)
- 20-25 chestnuts (See Notes)
- 2⅔ cups water
- Black sesame seeds (roasted/toasted)
- salt (kosher or sea salt; use half if using table salt) (optional)
Gather all the ingredients.
- Put rice in a large bowl. Gently wash the rice with cold water and discard water. Repeat this process about 3-4 times until water becomes almost translucent. Let the rice soak in water for 30 minutes. Transfer the rice into a sieve and drain for 15 minutes.
- Bring a medium pot of water to a boil. Put chestnuts in boiling water, cover with the lid, and turn off the heat. Set aside for 30 minutes and drain (It’s easier to peel when they are still warm).
- Using a knife, make an incision around the edge where the flat surface and bottom of a chestnut meets. Then start peeling the shell.
- Then peel the inner skin completely and soak in a bowl of water for 10 minutes. Peel the rest of chestnuts and change the water a few times.
- Put the rice, water, sake, and salt in a heavy bottom pot and lightly mix all together. Then place chestnuts on top.
- Bring the rice to a boil over medium heat. Take a quick peek to see if water is boiling (otherwise do not open the lid). Once water is boiling, turn the heat to low and cook covered for 12 to 13 minutes, or until the water is completely absorbed (take a quick peek!). If you see there is still water left, close the lid and continue cooking for a little longer.
- Remove the pot with the lid on from the heat source and let the rice steam for 10 minutes before opening the lid.
- Fluff up and mix the rice; wet a rice paddle and slice through the rice with the scooper, then fold over the rice. Sprinkle salt and black sesame seeds.
If you're using a rice cooker, follow manufacture's instruction for cooking rice (from Step 5).
Rice: You can omit 1/4 cup sweet rice and use just 2 1/4 cups short grain rice.
Chestnuts: If your chestnuts are big, cut them in half so that they will be cooked thoroughly.
Recipe by Namiko Chen of Just One Cookbook. All images and content on this site are copyright protected. Please do not use my images without my permission. If you’d like to share this recipe on your site, please re-write the recipe and link to this post as the original source. Thank you.
Oh this must taste good! Love those large chestnuts and your step-by-step in attaining the nut meat. Making this!
A lovely holiday weekend to you and your family Nami! 😉
Thank you Cristina! I hope you’re having a nice Thanksgiving weekend as well! xo
This looks good! I remember my mother roasting chestnuts in the oven this time of year: Yes, we had to peel them while they were still hot, as they’d be even harder to remove the shells when they were cold. If I crumbled the soft chestnuts inside, I’d get scolded, which may explain why I haven’t cooked chestnuts in a long time! 🙂
Just wondering: would it be possible to cook this in an electric rice cooker, particularly the “smart” kind with multiple settings?
Hi Hisaye! I love roasted chestnuts too! You can use your rice cooker (I usually use a rice cooker). A lot of people don’t have a rice cooker, so I made this rice with a pot. 🙂 Hope you enjoy this recipe!
What a perfect Thanksgiving post! I am so impressed by your step by step instructions. The clicks are beautiful!
This sounds fantastic! I love chestnuts, but haven’t actually made anything with them on my own. I’m definitely going to give this a try!
I’ve tried eating chestnuts but they didn’t really do anything for me.
Wow – how amazing to visit an actual rice field and see the rice being harvested. It looks beautiful. And chestnuts are one of my favorite things to eat. I just had some as my after dinner snack tonight! : ) They are not easy to come by fresh so I load up around the holidays when they’re available. I adore the sound of this rice dish with chestnuts!
Wow! Thanks for sharing this recipe! I love chestnut rice and I just saw these lovely big chestnut in season at our supermarket here. Going to get some to try this out.
What a great looking rice. Chestnuts aren’t very common in Oz so I don’t know much about them except that people roast them at Christmas time! And that they’re hard to peel – you’ve made that part look very easy xx And Happy Thanksgiving!
Beautiful clicks.. I loved them all.. This type of rice is very new to me.. looks delicious 🙂
Chestnuts and rice? Not a combo I’ve tried, but sounds wonderful. Love the light on your photos – wonderful stuff. As is the recipe. 😉 Thanks for this, and Happy Thanksgiving!
I absolutely love rice. I cannot eat a meal without it. I enjoyed your description of how rice is packaged only when the customer orders it. Must look into this brand. This is a wonderful rice recipe with chestnuts. We will surely enjoy it. Thanks for sharing, Nami!
I write a cookbook in Thai. There are some Japanese food in my menus. Your blog is my inspiration. I usually peel raw chestnuts and steam them. I will try this chest nut rice very soon. I did the sweet potato and it was so good.
Hi Torroong! Thank you so much for following my blog. 🙂 I personally think it’s hard to peel raw chestnuts. When the chestnuts are warm and absorbed some moisture, it’s easier to peel (still a lot of work to peel though. :)). I love Japanese sweet potato rice. So delicious!!
Hello Nami, will definitely want to try cooking this chestnut rice. Chestnut is one of my favourite snack. Can we use all Japanese short grain rice instead of mixture of the glutinuous rice. Will it make any different in the flavour of this dish ?
Hi Ann! Yes, you can use only short grain rice (2 1/4 cup). The flavor is pretty much same, but the texture will be more sticky (from sweet rice). Hope you enjoy this dish! 🙂
Hi. I know I love this dish already and I would like to try it. There is no much time to cook at the moment with the baby but later on.
Ciao
I have never eaten freshly milled rice, I am sure it would be an amazing eye opener. This is a great recipe with chestnuts. Such great pics.
Isn’t it amazing to visit the fields. Lovely.
I’ve never made anything else out of a chestnut other than roast it. This is such a fantastic looking dish. I am planning on a Japanese themed party, this would be so good. I will be visiting your blog for all the ideas.
Great one Nami. Enjoy the long weekend.
What a wonderful treat it would be to have freshly milled rice! And thanks for taking us on this lovely trip to see the rice being harvested. Isn’t that interesting the way that it is done. I wonder how they do it here in Australia?
I just know about this from you nave, even i was visiting almost hundrets of japanese restaurant here in Indonesia…
btw, can i use the dried or canned chestnut for this recipe???
i’m curious weather the chestnut will be overcooked and mashed during the cooking???
Hi Dedy! I’ve never used dried or canned chestnuts before. Since cooking time is about little bit over 10 minutes, I don’t think it gets mushy or overcooked. 🙂
Nami, you make a bowl of rice look sooooooo appealing 😉
This sounds so good, never tried anything similar.
I adore chestnuts and love the sound of this chestnut rice Nami! Thank you for sharing another great recipe and hope you and your family had an amazing Thanksgiving and you enjoy the rest of the weekend 🙂
Happy Thanksgiving to you, Nami, and your lovely family! Chestnuts are very tasty in herbal stews especially rice. I have glutinous rice in the pantry and I was figuring out what to do with them, apparently we have been using them instead of rice, which worked out well! Black sesame seeds are my favorite garnish! Btw, love the Le Creuset color, it actually looks beautiful in the photos!
お父様は新潟出身でしたら美味しいご飯ばっかり食べていましたでしょう。
栗ご飯はやはり秋／冬の味ですね。
This looks so delicious! Unfortunately it’s spring in Australia at the moment, but it’ll be great for when autumn comes around.
ちゃんと栗をむいて作るところエライ！私が最近作ったのは、栗の甘露煮使ったんだもんなあ。 お鍋、ル・クルーゼでごはん炊くのは、私の友人らでも流行ってます。私は持ってないんすけど。 早送りのテープだから、簡単そうに見えるけど、栗ごはん、本当に大変な労力ですよね。ご苦労さま。マジで美味しそう！いただきまーすって私が言いたいわ。
I have never worked with chestnuts… I would love to try this rice. 🙂 Hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving with your family. 🙂
I just love the simplicity of this recipe. It sounds so delicious especially I am a chestnut lover. Unfortunately, I have never had any success peeling the inner skin. After watching your video, I may want to give it a try again. Thank you so much, Nami!
I think I’ve never seen such beautiful looking raw rice,Nami!
It must taste divine, especially together with the delicate chestnut flavor.
Love the idea of chestnuts and rice – I’ve never tried that Nami, but it sounds especially good in the cold winter months.
I always wanted to know how chestnut taste…it’s just impossible to find it here. We don’t have too much kind of nuts, just pecans or nuts…that’s it 🙁
What a simple and yet amazing recipe!
I love chestnuts, and I know I’d love this recipe 🙂
Beautiful pictures, Nami. How lucky you are to receive a bag every year!
This is so interesting Nami, we learn so much from you!
What a lovely simple meal! We love chestnuts and I just bought yesterday one pack…can’t wait to try your delicious recipe. By the way lovely video, I enjoyed watching!
My parents love eating chestnuts so I’m sure they would love it if I showed them this recipe. I love the different rice dishes Asian culture come up with.
Nami, you already know that I am just crazy about chestnuts and although I made a chsetnut soup the other day, I have never tried this wonderful looking Chsetnut Rice before. I am sure that my kids would relly go for this if I made some wonderful chicken with it – hopefully the chestnuts in stores will still last for a while so I can buy many more and try new dished´s such as this one!
The pictures are just amazing – I love the photo of the rice bowl, just love it! I worked for I do not know how long on one picture yesterday, for some reason it just never looked right – so I know how much love and effort you put in all of our posts!
I love chestnuts and use them instead of potatoes, sometimes. Thanks for sharing this wonderful recipe of rice with chestnuts.
Thanks for sharing this rice recipe, now I have another way of serving rice. Nice one specially for this Christmas Season.
I am making this for dinner tonight. I compared it to my recipe and yours uses the mochigome, so I am trying it! Yummy!
Hi Susan! So sorry for my late response. I hope the rice came out well. Thank you so much for giving it a try! 🙂
Thank you for showing the boiling method for chestnuts! It looks a lot easier than roasting them. I’ve only roasted them one and it was rather difficult. Loved the flavor of them those. This rice does look delicious – simple flavors and textures! Great recipe as always Nami!
YUM! What a great way to highlight fall chestnuts! And I’m fascinated with the rice farm. Never saw the rice plant up close like that- amazing!
I simply love chestnuts and cooking them with rice looks really good!
I think you could convert me into chestnuts with such a beautiful bowl of rice 🙂 I love so much my rice and I know why: it’s apparently also koshihikari (though made in Italy). Last week I went in Paris to a very busy Japanese small restaurant and the rice was so awful… I think I got used to a very good one 😉
looks delicious and nice educational post
Love this one… I LOVE chestnut….
Love your videos… Great Job Girl!
Hi would you mind sharing which blog platform you’re
working with? I’m going to startt my oown blog in thhe
near future but I’m having a difficult time deciding between BlogEngine/Wordpress/B2evolution and
Drupal. The reason I ask is because your layout seems different then most blogs and I’m
looking for smething unique. P.S Apologies for getting off-topic but I had to ask!
So light & fluffy! You’re so talented! I never thought of chestnut , i love to have a bowl.
What a great family recipe, Nami! Thank you for sharing- it is beautifully shot as well.
Simply gorgeous!
Hi Nami,
I just want to say a big THANK YOU to you to all the lovely Japanese recipes you share on this wonderful blog of yours. Your works are beautiful and I can tell how much effort you put into making each of these recipes and videos before sharing it with your readers. They are really great so keep up the good work!
I am a Singaporean but now living in Kyoto, studying Japanese. I am so glad to be able to refer to your website every time I want to cook some Japanese food. With access to the all the wide varieties of fresh food products here in Japan but do not know how to use or cook them, your blog really provides me with a lot of useful information and insights. So, thank you very very much. 🙂
It is now autumn now here in Japan and I see chestnuts, sanma fish, new rice etc etc in the market and I’m looking forward to cook them with the help of your recipes here. Please do not stop posting as I always am looking forward to your new recipes online! 🙂
Hi Fiona! Thank you so much for reading my blog and watching my videos. I appreciate your kind words and feedback about our work. 🙂
How wonderful that you’re living in Kyoto! You’ll have no problem getting ingredients I use in my recipes. 😉
Thank you again for your sweet words. Enjoy fall recipes. I’m so jealous that you can enjoy all the Japanese fall ingredients! I miss chestnuts, sanma, satsumaimo… mushrooms! Ah I love fall the best in Japan. 🙂
Hey Nami! I LOVE your site!! One question, what type of main course would you normally make with this? Some type of fish? Would love your recommendations!
Hi Lucy! Thank you so much! Yes, since it’s a popular fall dish, I’d cook grilled fish – grilled sanma (pacific saury – but hard to find), mackerel, or salted salmon… simple dish works best. Because the chestnut is very subtle taste, I won’t match with heavy flavor main dish. 🙂
I love chestnuts, but not easy to find fresh ones. Can I substitute the dried chestnuts which can be found every day in the Chinese supermarkets around here in the Bay Area? I would cook this rice dish any time of the year, not just during the fall.
Hi Irene! I’ve never tried with cooked chestnuts before, but I think it’ll be okay. I’m just worried about the texture and color of it. If you give it a try, let us know!
Hello Nami,
I happened to have some chestnuts on hand so thought of checking out kuri gohan!
Question though, did you use the rice cooker cup for measuring the water? (My rice cooker cup is the 180 ml type.) Or can I just fill the water up to the 2 & 1/4 cup marking in my rice cooker?
Btw, will roasted chestnuts work for this recipe? My chestnuts are the ready-to-eat kind.
Hi Bernice! I usually write “rice cooker cups” when I measure with the 180 ml cup. In this recipe, I use the American cup; 1 cup = 240 ml. If you’re making it with a rice cooker, yes, follow the rice cooker measurement. My chestnuts were raw so I have to cook (step 3) and peel. 🙂