Hazelnuts in Milk Chocolate

Chocolate-coated hazelnuts in creamy milk chocolate

Hazelnuts in milk chocolate from Tastelanghe in Piedmont. Whole, roasted Tonda Gentile hazelnuts, making up 35% of the pack, coated layer by layer with milk chocolate in a panning machine. 110 grams.

Hazelnuts in milk chocolate are chocolate-coated nuts from Piedmont. At Tastelanghe, whole, roasted Tonda Gentile hazelnuts from their own family farm are coated in a panning machine until each nut has an even layer of milk chocolate. The nut content is 35%.

The classic among chocolate nuts

Creamy, crunchy, nutty – chocolate on the outside, a whole roasted hazelnut on the inside. The most familiar of the four varieties and the one you reach for first. One handful reliably leads to two, because one nut is never enough.

The chocolate makes up 65%, the nut 35%. In industrial chocolate nuts, the nut is often the smaller part and the sugar layer the larger one – you notice this when you have to suck on them for a long time before you reach anything at all.

Here, the coating is thin enough for the nut to take center stage. When you bite down, the chocolate yields immediately and the roasted nut gives a satisfying crunch.

Panned in a drum, layer by layer

The roasted nuts go into a rotating drum where liquid chocolate is added in portions. Each layer must dry before the next can follow – a process that takes hours and cannot be rushed.

If you add too much too quickly, the nuts stick together into clumps, and the entire batch is lost. It is one of the few confectionery processes where patience is not an accessory, but the actual ingredient.

In the end, each nut has its own shell and the typical rounded shape. The hazelnuts are grown in Somano in the Alta Langa, where the Quazzo family has been farming groves since 1891, now in the fifth generation.

Why you can't put them down

Chocolate-coated nuts have an unpleasant property: you eat them mindlessly. Unlike a bar, there is no portion limit, no piece you break off and then stop.

If you want to protect yourself from this, fill a small bowl and put the bag away. If you don't want to protect yourself, put the bag on the table and your evening is saved.

The coating makes up about two-thirds of the weight, but it is thinner than this number suggests. Chocolate is heavy, and a layer of barely two millimeters already adds quite a bit to the scale.

If you cut them open instead of biting into them, you can see it: a narrow brown ring around a large, light-colored core.

What the coating does to the nut

A chocolate shell is not just about flavor; it is also protection. It seals the roasted nut airtight and prevents the nut oil from going rancid.

This is why chocolate-coated nuts keep significantly longer than roasted nuts left open in a bowl. Stored in a cool, dry place, they remain just as intended for months.

They also work well as an ingredient: halved and spread over a chocolate cake before it goes into the oven, they won't sink all the way in and will provide texture to the surface.

On a cheese board between blue cheese and grapes

They are in their element enjoyed plain with an espresso or a cappuccino in the morning. Sprinkled over muesli, they turn breakfast into something special, and baked into chocolate cookies, even more so.

On a cheese board between blue cheese and grapes, they are a little surprise, and in a bowl next to the coffee at Christmas, they rarely last long. For guests, this is the most uncomplicated variety in our assortment.

You can find more specialties from Tastelanghe made from the same hazelnuts here – hazelnuts in dark chocolate for those who prefer it bitter, hazelnut chocolate as a bar, or other nuts from our assortment.