Hazelnuts, loosely resembling acorns, are tree nuts that enjoy immense popularity globally, no doubt facilitated by their fraternization with chocolate (which gives us things like Nutella, for instance). We’re pretty sure they make all the other nuts out there jealous, except maybe the peanut, since it’s also pretty popular!
Primarily grown in Turkey, Italy, Greece, Georgia, Azerbaijan, south of Catalonia in Spain, Kent in the United Kingdom, as well as in Oregon and Washington in the United States, hazelnuts are usually harvested in midautumn after the trees have shed their leaves and nuts. Filberts, by the way, are technically a type of hazelnut cultivar, but the name is often used interchangeably with hazelnut.
The largest producer of hazelnuts, by far, is Turkey, with approximately 75 percent of worldwide production. However, our favorite hazelnuts come from the Piedmont region in Italy, as well as Sicily, where the hazelnuts seem to have the most complex flavor. Because of differences in the soil, climate, moisture levels, and other environmental factors, the nuts from these regions have slightly different qualities. It is remarkable just how much these factors will affect the underlying taste of the nut, but they do!
In searching for our favorite hazelnuts for our Hazelnut Ice Cream and Gianduja Ice Cream, we managed to find a hazelnut-processing facility in Italy that not only produces some of the best-tasting hazelnuts we’ve ever eaten but also operates in an ecologically friendly manner by generating electricity at the plant using discarded hazelnut shells. The Piedmont hazelnut, or la nocciola Piemonte, with its smoky, buttery flavor, is origin-certified by the Italian government. We use Piedmont hazelnuts in combination with Sicilian ones that we also love. Together, the nuts are ground into a paste that is perfectly suited to flavor our ice cream.