Saturday, July 29, 2006

Ingredient Challenge: Hazelnut Paste


Yep. You heard me right. Hazelnut Paste. In America, I would say this product is pretty much a novelty. But, I love hazelnuts. I absolutely love them. I have made a chocolate hazelnut cake before (but it didn't quite turn out the way I wanted). I drink hazelnut flavored creamer in my coffee (or rather, I drink hazelnut syrup and coffee in my cream). In fact, I won't usually drink coffee if there's no hazelnut creamer or syrup around.

Knowing my fondness for the taste of hazelnut, a friend of mine who visited Italy recently sent me a little box with postcards, stamps, and a bottle of hazelnut paste from Napoli. I was so excited.... and yet remain clueless as to how to use it. The stuff looks like peanut-butter. I have no idea what to do with it....

...thus the Ingredient Challenge was born!

Can you help?

I'm going to look up recipes using hazelnut paste to find something to do with this lovely jar of buttered hazelnuts... but until then, would you please leave me a comment if you have a favorite hazelnut recipe that you think my jar of hazelnut paste would compliment well? I would love to hear from you.


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5 comments:

Anonymous said...

I reckon you can use it in anything that calls for peanut butter. So I'm thinking hazelnut cookies? Depending on how strong it is (and I imagine it has a pretty strong flavour) you would probably want to decrease the amount a tad.

Anonymous said...

Hey, what you have there is known in Italy as "Nutella" (google it) and it is awesome on sliced bread.. trust me.
http://www.nutellausa.com/
Maybe what you have is a local "homemade" version of nutella.
Go ahead, eat it.. ! :-)

RG.

Maya Papaya said...

Nutella is chocolate with hazelnuts. Is this stuff from Italy chocolate with hazelnuts? Or just hazelnut paste?

Anonymous said...

hi there, i've come across this site in my search for hazelnut paste, i'm trying to find it so i can make hazelnut ice cream. but someone said you may have nutella, nutella is a hazelnut flavoured chocolate spread, delicious on its own or on bread but i don't think this is what you have. try the ice cream. use a vanilla recipe and just replace the vanilla with the hazelnut paste.
yvonne

Anonymous said...

What you have is hazelnut paste not nutella, the label on the jar is clear in Italian. I use it to flavour Creme Brule or Crem caramel and you can highten the flavour with a touch of Drambouie Liquer. Just make a regular mixture of your favourite recipe and wisk it in a bit at a time till you get the flavour concentration you desire.
Chef Rodolfo Santo