Читать книгу The Taste of Britain - Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall - Страница 289

The hazelnut, Corylus avallana, is indigenous to all of Britain and there is evidence of its use for food from archaeological sites from the Neolithic onwards. Hazelnuts have been cultivated since at least the sixteenth century but these seem mainly to have been another species, native to south-eastern Europe, Corylus maxima, which is distinguished by the length of its husk. The name filbert seems always to have referred to nuts with long husks which covered the nut itself. Cobnut was used to describe ‘our hedge Nut or Hasell Nut Tree’, while filberts were ‘that which groweth in gardens and orchards’ (Gerard, 1597).

Kent was already famous for its Filberts when John Evelyn wrote his great treatise on forestry, Sylva, in 1664. They continued to be grown as part of a mixed husbandry with hops, apples and cherries (Roach, 1985). There were 3 or 4 important varieties: the one known as the ‘Kentish’ Filbert was the white-skinned.

This was ultimately displaced, either from 1812 or from 1830 (depending which Lambert was in fact responsible for its introduction), by an improved breed called Lambert’s Filbert. It was inconvenient that history never guaranteed the identity of its progenitor. Lovers of simplicity will also decry the renaming of Lambert’s Filbert as the Kentish Cobnut, but that is what happened around the turn of the century.

Mrs Beeton (1861) wrote, ‘It is supposed that, within a few miles of Maidstone, in Kent, there are more Filberts grown than in all England besides; and it is from that place that the London market is supplied.’ By the early 1900s, over 7,000 acres (approximately 1,750 hectares), mostly in Kent, was given over to hazelnuts, and substantial quantities were exported to the USA. There had been much experiment with different varieties, although the Kentish Cob reigned supreme. Thereafter, nut production declined greatly, until only a few specialist growers remained. The reasons are largely to do with changes in agricultural and orcharding practice in Kent, as well as the high level of handiwork involved in maintaining the cropping trees. Little research has been undertaken to improve strains. Kent remains the chief centre of production, but there are orchards in Sussex, Devon and Worcestershire.