The Bestest Butter of All: Chocolate Hazelnut

I love butters of all sorts: peanut butter, almond butter, cocoa butter, cashew butter, sesame butter (okay tahini), coconut butter, apple butter, vegan butter (aka margarine), even shea butter. But nothing, and I mean nothing, compares to how strongly I feel about chocolate hazelnut butter. To me, all other butters of any kind pale in comparison.

The omni world knows this stuff as Nutella… vegans and other folks may be more familiar with Justin’s brand. But me, well, I’m too cheap and too much of a purist for my own darn good, so I prefer homemade.

Luckily, whipping up a jar full of this stuff is ridiculously easy…

Chocolate Hazelnut Butter

What you need:

a food processor, or pretty decent blender that can chop up nuts with no worries

a spoon

about 3 cups roasted hazelnuts, pieces or whole

about 3 tbsp – 1/4 cup (or more) cocoa powder, start with just a little, and add until flavor/consistency is reached

a few tablespoons agave, or other liquid sweetener

1/2 tsp salt

a jar to store it in

a lid for the jar

What you do:

Place nuts into food processor and blend until smooth. This could take several minutes. Scrape down the sides as necessary. Add in cocoa powder, agave and salt. Pulse quickly to blend. Stir well, and spoon into your storage jar. Close lid tightly. Store in fridge.

See how easy?! Now go and make some!

 

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21 Comments

  1. Posted April 17, 2011 at 11:27 am | Permalink

    That looks A-mazing!

  2. Gabrielle
    Posted April 17, 2011 at 3:25 pm | Permalink

    Yup, making this! <3

  3. Posted April 17, 2011 at 4:07 pm | Permalink

    Oh WOW. I feel like I could write the word wow over and over again and it would still not show how excited I am about this. :)

  4. Posted April 17, 2011 at 5:09 pm | Permalink

    Your homemade nutella looks delicious!!

    • allyson
      Posted April 19, 2011 at 3:50 am | Permalink

      Thank you so much, Julie!! Those hazelnuts are the best ever… <3 <3

  5. Deer88
    Posted April 17, 2011 at 5:22 pm | Permalink

    Hello, I’m a new reader ^ ^ I’m italian and I’m vegan since December ^ ^
    This blog is so cute and useful!!!

    I can’t wait to try these recipes…look so yummy ^ ^

  6. Posted April 17, 2011 at 5:42 pm | Permalink

    So, I did go and make this immediately after having read the post. I happened to discover a bag of hazelnuts in the back of my fridge yesterday and was thinking that I needed to find something to do with them. This was just as easy as the recipe sounded – and was the first time I made my own nut butter.

    The flavor of this is delicious! I used raw honey and enjoyed the depth of flavor it added. I ran into a bit of a problem with the texture though. The hazelnuts blended well, and turned into a gorgeous creamy butter – almost on the side of too soft to be spreadable. As soon as the cocoa powder hit the mixer, it dried up into something in between paste and crumbly. I was tempted to add a bit of water or oil to smooth it out, but opted for delicious flavor and not chancing the unknown. Have you ever run into this?

    Thanks for the delicious recipes and beautiful photography!

    • allyson
      Posted April 18, 2011 at 3:07 pm | Permalink

      Hi Rachel! Awesome that you tried out the recipe! I’m not sure about the clumping (maybe a difference in cocoa powder- I’ll edit to make the range bigger. I think starting out with less will help to better gauge the consistency than putting it all in at once).
      I can say that this butter is more spreadable than a typical jar of peanut butter… although it’s not runnier than some natural PB brands I have seen on the shelves; it’s about the same. I would say, if the clumping happened to me, add a drop of water, or even non-dairy milk (probably what nutella uses it for) until it reaches a consistency that makes you happy.

      Thanks so much again!! <3

    • Janet
      Posted August 8, 2013 at 9:57 pm | Permalink

      I just made this and it is better than Justin’s. I used 3 cups hazelnuts (mostly without skin), 2 T cocoa, 2 T. agave, 1/2 t salt and 1 T VANILLA.

  7. Posted April 18, 2011 at 1:09 am | Permalink

    LOVE this site! You guys did such a beautiful job with it. WOW. It’s going on my blog roll for sure. Thanks for the inspiration :)

  8. Posted April 18, 2011 at 1:36 am | Permalink

    Great recipe. And beyond that, thrilled for the arrival of this site!

  9. Posted April 18, 2011 at 4:23 am | Permalink

    Holy crow. Yes, yes and yes.

    BTW, this new site looks AMAZING. You guys are my new foodie heros.

    • Posted April 18, 2011 at 7:16 am | Permalink

      Aw, thanks Kris! I was so glad to meet you the other day.
      xo
      kittee

  10. Posted April 18, 2011 at 1:10 pm | Permalink

    Hooray!!!! I can’t wait to try this. My husband refuses to give up his Nutella so I am totally going to sneak this in and see what happens. Grazie mille!!!

  11. Posted April 18, 2011 at 5:23 pm | Permalink

    Wheeeee!!!!! So stoked the site is up and running! Beautiful work ladies!

  12. Mary
    Posted April 18, 2011 at 5:46 pm | Permalink

    This looks amazing! Can’t wait to try this and impress my kids, as we are already fans of Justin’s brand.

    Thank you ladies SO much for putting together this fantastic site, a much-needed (and beautiful) resource for us vegans who also prefer to be g-f. I’m already overwhelmed by all the goodness, and am appreciating all the resource info and links, too. I’ll be sharing it with friends & family. Bravo!

  13. Posted April 19, 2011 at 4:09 am | Permalink

    You guys rock. The site is beautiful and I am know it will be so VERY appreciated. Love the artwork and beautiful photos and excellent information. I will be back soon.
    Cheers,
    Terris

  14. Katy
    Posted April 19, 2011 at 4:35 am | Permalink

    Where were you folks when I had to be xgfx!? I’m so envious that now, two years after I was able to tolerate gluten again, that there’s been a boom in the xgfx world. I always felt so alone in vegan communities and gf communities because very few people were xgfx. I’m happy I can eat gluten again, but you’ll have to pry the millet, amaranth, quinoa, and besan out of my cold dead hands.

  15. Heather
    Posted April 19, 2011 at 1:57 pm | Permalink

    Thank you so much for this recipe!! I quit buying Nutella years ago because it’s like crack to me, if I know it’s there I can’t not eat it. I made this last night and was not only totally satisfied with the result, but I got to control the ingredients – it’s sweet enough that I love it and it kills my cravings, but it’s not so sweet that I hunt it like the sweet-toothed fiend I am. Seriously, so excited about it. THANK YOU!

  16. Heather
    Posted May 2, 2011 at 10:44 am | Permalink

    Sadly I don’t have a food processor worth anything (although I really want one!) so mine was quite chunky, but oh so very good! I’d like to say it was rustic (probably more of a choke hazard), but the flavor was excellent. If I could magically possess a food processor, I’d hate to think how much of this I would eat!

  17. badgerette
    Posted August 4, 2011 at 7:22 pm | Permalink

    thaaaank yoooooou! I just moved and they don’t sell Justin’s here. I feel the same way about this stuff so I am excited to make this when our last jar of Justin’s runs out.

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