Nutella

Nutella is a sweetened hazelnut and cocoa spread made by the Italian company Ferrero since 1964. Born in Piedmont, it has become one of the best-known spreads in the world and a staple of the afternoon snack in much of Europe.

History

Its origins lie in the post-war years in Alba, a Piedmontese town surrounded by hazelnut orchards. There, Pietro Ferrero ran a pastry shop and began working with gianduja, a traditional local blend of hazelnut and chocolate. Cocoa was scarce after the war, making conventional chocolate hard to produce, so combining it with local hazelnuts made practical sense. In 1946 he sold an initial batch of about 300 kilos of gianduja paste, which was sold as a solid block.

In 1949 he began selling a creamy version, which he named Supercrema in 1951. Around 1963 his son Michele revamped it with the aim of selling it across Europe; the recipe was changed and the product was renamed Nutella. The first jar left the Alba factory on 20 April 1964, and it sold well almost immediately. Its spread coincided with Italy's post-war economic boom. It reached the United States for the first time in 1983.

Production later spread across several plants, including Alba, Stadtallendorf in Germany, which has operated since 1956, Brantford in Canada, Poços de Caldas in Brazil and Vladimir in Russia. Global output was about 350,000 tonnes in 2013, and by 2015 it was sold in around 75 countries. The formula varies depending on where it is made.

Culture

In Italy, Nutella is a staple of children's snacks. It is spread on slices of filone or sandwiched between slices of pancarrè sandwich bread, a habit especially common during school break. It also fills cornetti, bomboloni and crêpes, and appears in home recipes of all kinds. Its sweetness and texture have tied it to childhood and everyday routine, as much as to the food identity of many Italian families.

Its consumption has spread to adults and other countries, where it is often marketed as a hazelnut cream, since Italian law does not allow it to be called a chocolate cream when it falls short of the required cocoa content. In 2012, a proposal to raise the tax on palm oil, one of its main ingredients, was dubbed the Nutella tax by the media. In 2014 Poste Italiane issued a commemorative stamp for the brand's 50th anniversary, showing a jar on a golden background.

Trivia