Hazelnuts in Caramel Chocolate

Chocolate-coated hazelnuts with caramelized sugar

Hazelnuts in caramel chocolate by Tastelanghe from Piedmont. Whole, roasted Tonda Gentile hazelnuts, making up 35% of the pack, coated in a rotating drum with a caramel chocolate made from real caramelized sugar. 110 grams.

Hazelnuts in caramel chocolate are chocolate-coated nuts from Piedmont. At Tastelanghe, whole, roasted hazelnuts from their own family farm are coated in a rotating drum with caramel chocolate containing two percent real caramelized sugar. The nut content is 35%.

Burnt sugar meets roasted aroma

A whole roasted hazelnut in a shell of caramel chocolate: sweet, nutty, roasted. Accompanied by a hint of burnt sugar in the background. The caramel note comes from real caramelized sugar in the recipe, not from a flavoring bottle.

Two types of roasting meet here: that of the nut and that of the sugar. This is why this variety tastes deeper than a simple milk chocolate coating – they are related aromas that reinforce one another.

In terms of color, they lie between the light and dark varieties, a warm caramel beige. In a mixed bowl, you can spot them immediately.

Slowly coated instead of quickly covered

In the rotating drum, each nut is coated with chocolate in portions, layer by layer, with drying intervals in between. Those who take shortcuts end up with clumps instead of individual nuts.

This variety is the only one of the four bound with sunflower lecithin instead of soy lecithin – a small difference in the recipe that can be the deciding factor for people with a soy intolerance.

Thirty-five percent of the pack is nut. It grows on 40 hectares in Somano in the Alta Langa, where the Quazzo family has been managing hazelnut groves since 1891, now in the fifth generation.

Caramel that deserves the name

Caramel appears on many packages, and it usually involves flavoring. Real caramel is only created when sugar is heated until it decomposes and forms hundreds of new compounds – that is chemistry, but a kind that takes place in every pan.

Here, the caramelized sugar is declared at two percent and is part of the chocolate, not added afterwards. You can taste the difference especially in the finish, where real caramel becomes slightly bitter while an aroma just remains sweet.

Caramel and hazelnut share a history: both are created by heat. What happens in the pan with the sugar and what happens in the drum with the nut is, at its core, the same process – sugars and proteins react with each other and form new aromas.

That is why this variety seems more integrated than the other three. They are not two flavors side-by-side, but two variations on the same theme.

Why they don't stick together

Caramel-containing coatings are stickier than pure chocolate because the caramelized sugar attracts moisture. To ensure the nuts remain individual, they receive a thin polish at the end that seals the surface.

That is why they shine and feel dry, even though there is something soft underneath. Without this final step, you would have a single clump in the bag after two weeks.

A bowl of them on the desk

You reach for them with your afternoon espresso anyway, and after an Italian meal, they are the sweet conclusion. Sprinkled over vanilla ice cream, with a pinch of fleur de sel on top, you bring the caramel tone to the very front.

They also make a great gift to go with coffee, and in a bowl on your desk, they are more dangerous than any other variety.

In our shop, you can find other specialties from Tastelanghe made from the same hazelnuts – hazelnuts in white chocolate for a sweeter treat, caramel chocolate with whole hazelnuts as a bar, or other nuts from our assortment.