There are still a few stragglers left from Christmas looking for a good home. A handful of sticky sugar-frosted fruits, a few cubes of Turkish delight, some slabs of chocolate and the last few nuts in their shells.
What really interests me are the hazelnuts. The early, milky cobnuts of autumn are long gone: sweet milky nuggets so soft and white you can shave them and add them to a salad of crisp white and ivory leaves and pears. (Chicory, pale frisée, fresh hazelnuts and Comice pears is a beautifully serene salad on a white plate.) But by this time of year hazelnuts are best skinned and enrobed in darkest chocolate or shiny, brittle caramel: age-old marriages that work.
I use hazelnuts, finely ground, just as I would ground almonds, to add moisture to a cake, to improve its keeping quality and the tenderness of its crumb. If they are toasted before grinding, they will add much flavour.
Once the inner skin of a hazelnut dries and darkens, it is best removed – a pernickety job that leaves your kitchen covered in flakes of loose skin. It is best, I find, to toast them in a pan or in the oven, then rub them in a spotless tea towel so they tumble together and the skin flakes off, leaving you with a clean, golden hazelnut to grind, chop or dip into melted chocolate.
Even better, I think, to give the nuts a double toasting: the first to encourage the skins to flake, and then a second, once they have been removed, to give a deeper flavour. I have always toasted nuts in a dry frying pan, but I have recently found that the real trick is to roast them slowly. By roasting or toasting with the heat low, the nuts get to cook right through. A high heat will end up with patchy results, even black flashes where the nuts have stayed still for too long in the pan. Keep the heat low, move them round, and let them brown slowly and evenly. A job, I admit, for the patient cook, but one that is well worth it.
Chocolate fruit and nut crisp
A slab of dark chocolate for breaking into jagged pieces, encrusted with crystallised fruit and roasted nuts, or indeed anything sweet that needs using up.
Serves 10
hazelnuts 100g, shelled
dark chocolate 400g
mixed crystallised fruits – pears, citron, clementines 400g in total
sugared rose petals a handful
sea salt flakes a teaspoon
You will also need a 32 x 22cm baking tray lined with baking parchment.
Toast the hazelnuts: set the oven at 180C/gas mark 4. Put the nuts on a baking sheet in a single layer, then bake for 15 to 20 minutes, watching them carefully, removing them when they are thoroughly brown. If you prefer, toast them in a dry frying pan over a low heat.
Put a pan of water on to boil with a heatproof glass or china bowl resting snugly on top. The bottom of the pan shouldn’t quite touch the water. Break the chocolate into small pieces and let it melt in the bowl over the hot water. It will melt more smoothly if you don’t stir it; just leave it to melt, occasionally pushing any unmelted pieces under the surface.
Pour the melted chocolate on to the lined tray and shake firmly to spread over the surface and into the corners.
Chop the crystallised fruits into small wedges or dice. Scatter them over the chocolate. Break the rose petals into small pieces and distribute them among the fruits. Roughly chop the toasted hazelnuts and scatter them over the chocolate.
Lastly, add the sea salt flakes, then leave in a cool place to set. The fridge is ideal for a short time, but don’t leave it in there longer than an hour. Snap into jagged pieces.
Hazelnut maple biscuits
Tender, crumbly maple-scented biscuits.
Makes about 16
hazelnuts, shelled and skinned 120g
plain flour 250g
butter 225g
light muscovado sugar 50ml
dark maple syrup 50ml
salt a pinch
To finish:
whole hazelnuts, skinned 20g
Set the oven at 180C/gas mark 4. Put the hazelnuts on a baking tray in a single layer, then toast them till they are lightly coloured on all sides. Moving them around every now and again will aid even browning. Remove them from the oven and crush to crumbs using a food processor. They should be fine, but not as fine as commercial ground almonds. The nuts should feel a little gritty between the fingers.
Cut the butter into small pieces and put it in the bowl of a food mixer fitted with a flat beater attachment. Add the sugar and beat till pale and fluffy. Pour in the maple syrup, a tablespoon at a time, beating continually. If the mixture appears to curdle, don’t worry, just keep beating. It will eventually become smooth.
Mix the salt into the flour then fold in the nuts. Gradually incorporate the flour and nuts into the creamed butter, sugar and maple syrup. Roll the dough into a thick sausage about 3cm in diameter, wrap in clingfilm and refrigerate for 45 minutes.
Set the oven at 160C/gas mark 3. Unwrap the dough and slice it into about 16 biscuits. Place them, with a little space among them, on a baking sheet lined with baking parchment. Roughly chop the whole hazelnuts then put a few on top of each biscuit, pressing them gently down into the dough. Bake for 20 minutes. They won’t look cooked at this point, but let them cool for a few minutes on the tray, then carefully lift off with a palette knife and cool on a wire baking rack.
Email Nigel at nigel.slater@observer.co.uk. Follow Nigel on Twitter@NigelSlater
