So I found a place next to the river where people have been lighting a fire, a real remote, ‘cannot be found out by anyone’, place. And I found some dry sticks in the forest. And I’ve been yearning to light a fire to roast chestnuts on. So, I made a plan.
I haven’t had a chance to light a fire in 5 years, because I’ve been living in the city, and there’s no backyard, and no public places to light one legally. Since other people got away with a fire on the remote riverbank, I decided I could too. I’ve gotten so nervous, because what if my fire-lighting skills have gone away and I couldn’t light one anymore? And what if I didn’t have the correct tools to roast chestnuts anyway? All I had was an old, metal, twisted pan. And to make it more interesting, it rained the morning I decided to go for it.
So I’m there, walked for 45 minutes just to get there, with my dry sticks, and my chestnuts, and some newspaper and matches, excited and nervous. I knew I couldn’t make a big enough fire with only a few sticks, so I gathered the wet pieces of wood all over the place; they were wet from the outside, but inside, they were all dried wood. So I calculated, that the fire will be very smoke-heavy, because all that wetness will create smoke, but once the fire dries the wood, it will burn. I had fun breaking apart the branches with my hands, made me feel powerful.
I put some rocks in the bottom of the fire pit, to make sure it was dry, and for the fire to have airflow underneath, it’s good for a fire to draw oxygen from below. I made a little cone with the dry sticks around the newspapers. The fire lit up on my second try!
To actually roast something, you need the fire to burn for a while, reach a certain temperature, and create a good amount of ember. Ember is hotter than the fire and that’s what you want for roasting. My fire struggled a lot due to the wet wood, and I had to tend to it fervently, but at one point I figured it was hot enough for what I wanted it for, and I put my little improvised tool on it.
And it worked. I got to stare at the pretty flames, listen to the lovely crinkling, got all warmed up and my spirits light, all while the chestnuts were sizzling and getting to be that perfect flavour that cannot be obtained otherwise. I roasted 3 pans of it, ate one portion at the spot, and left to share the rest with friends at home. My hands still smell like fire. I’ve been incredibly pleased and happy with myself; all that food completely from nature, improvised tools working out immediately, and my ability to light fires stayed exactly where it was even with no practice. I feel like I’m going to make it just fine out there.
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