Gianduja

  • As Noted In: 1001 Foods You Must Taste Before You Die, Quintessence Editions

A specialty of Turin, Gianduja is a rich smooth chocolate spread traditionally made by blending hazelnuts to a paste and mixing with cocoa, cocoa butter and sugar. Sometime back when cocoa imports were limited, Piedmont chocolatiers blended finely milled hazelnut with cocoa, cocoa butter and sugar to create a smooth paste. The Gianduja character is the archetypal Piedmontese, a native of the Italian region Piedmont. During carnival time in 1865, a Gianduja character handed out foil wrapped Gianduja chocolates.

Spreadable gianduja is a thick creamy paste made from up to 50% hazelnuts. Nutella was created during as a hard loaf of Gianduja during World War II, by chocolatier Pietro Ferrero who made the most of his supply of cacao during the war-related shortages by combining hazelnuts, almonds, sugar or molasses, cocoa powder and vegetable fat to create pasta gianduja. In 1949, the inadvertent addition of cocoa butter made the Gianduja loaf into a spread. Authentic gianduja is made from toasted hazelnuts, sugar, butter and cream while Nutella is a commercial spread made from sweetened palm oil spread, cocoa solids and only about 13% hazelnuts. - AsNotedIn





Places
Timeline
Y/M/D Person Association Description Place Locale Event
1800/00/00 In the early 19th century, chocolatiers in Turin, Italy, create Gianduja by combinding local hazelnuts with chocolate.
1860/00/00 In the 1860s, Michele Prochet offers cioccolato di Gianduja at a local carnival. The confection made of hazelnut paste, cocoa, sugar and vanilla, is named for a puppet who symbolized the villagers. Turin Piedmont
1883/00/00 Fanfani and Frizzi's "Nuovo Vocabolario Metodico della Lingua Italiana" describes gianduia as "small balls or morsels of superfine, tender chocolate ... commonly consumed in all of Italy by people of a certain affluence."
1885/00/00 A French Jesuit returning from a mission to Armenia notices bags of hazelnuts loaded on the ship, destined for chocolate makers in Marseille. Gianduja is called chocolat a la noisette in French.
1889/00/00 The Association of Swiss Analytical Chemists deems chocolat a la noisette as an established chocolate product.
1895/00/00 LIFE Media In the 1890s, Swiss-made gianduia is advertised in the United States in LIFE magazine and the San Francisco Call.
1897/00/00 Henry Lyonnet writes an essay on the history of Gianduia in Piedmont, describing the confection as "those delicious bonbons of chocolat a la noisette that are enveloped in small paper wrappers of gold and silver, and that bring joy to children".

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Particulars for :
Product Kind Food
Food Attribute Italian Food
Food Attribute Piemonte Food
Food Attribute Sweets
Food Category Victual




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