A Few of My Favourite Things !

Is there anyone out there who doesn’t have good memories of Nutella, seriously. I’m sure that I don’t know any of them. My memories of Nutella stem not only from my childhood, but from our subsequent travels in Europe.

But, we will start from the beginning when I used to bring Nutella sandwiches made with thinly sliced Sunblest white bread to primary school. In around Grade 5, a new loaf came along in the form of the extra soft, light and airy Country Split loaf. Suddenly, it seemed, every sandwiche was made with these thicker slices so, of course, my Nutella sandwiches HAD to be made with this bread too. Even at that time, I was always quite particular about how my sandwiches were made and eaten. My sandwiches had to have a thick, oozy layer of the chocolate goodness - forget that thin smear just in the middle of the bread versions that my dad preferred. Nope, it had to be spread right to the edges of the bread. When I brought out the sandwich at lunch time, I would then hold the sandwich in both hands and squish it down between my fingers and thumb until the cross section revealed equal proportions of the white, brown, white layers. Occassionally, I would then roll it into a cigar shape before nibbling away at the sandwich.

Later on, I discovered that Nutella paired beautifully with both vanilla or chocolate ice cream. I would soften the Sara Lee Ultrachocolate ice cream in the microwave until it had the consistency of soft serve, then swirl in teaspoonfuls of Nutella - how’s that for a chocolate hit! What a joy it was then to spoon the creamy concoction into my mouth and pressing the hardened Nutella chunks with my tongue against the roof of my mouth causing it to melt gradually.

There was then a lull in my Nutella enjoyment until my first trip to Europe, when my memories of it again come into sharp focus. Paris and the ubiquitous crepe stalls - need I say more? The wafting, glorious scent of hot crepes spread with nutella…the thought of which can still cause me to swoon. Needless to say, A. & I had a few of these during our time in France. It seems that Nutella is not only enjoyed in France but also in Italy, where large families (or so I assume) can purchase 3 kg jars of this stuff from the supermarket. You should’ve seen the amazement in my eyes when I first came across one of these bottles. I cradled it in my arms with hopes of carrying it away with me, but alas, the (im)practicality of lugging a 3 kg jar of Nutella across Europe wouldn’t allow for this.

There is one memory of Nutella that makes me laugh instead of drool however. We were having a chat with some American friends during our time in Italy about Nutella. As with many othe words (like Adidas), they had a way of pronoucing it that quite clashed with everyone else’s and one friend insisted on pronoucing it as new-tella rather than nut-ella. There was no way she was backing down from this being the correct pronouciation until A. asked “So do you eat hazel-newts?”

Nowadays, we often have a tiny bottle sitting in the fridge as A. likes to have a spoonful every now and then (I prefer it at room temp myself). In honour of the many happy memories that Nutella has provided, I’m celebrating World Nutella Day with these chewy macaroons in which Nutella plays a starring role. I was actually after a slightly lighter cookie with a crispier shell but these Gordon Ramsey macaroons did well enough…all gone now.

Technorati Tags:nutella day, nutella, macaroons

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 6th, 2007 at 8:25 am and is filed under cookies, food blogging events, chocolate, food thoughts, dessert. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.