Hazelnuts

I love hazelnuts. Hazelnuts in chocolate, hazelnut ice cream, and especially hazelnut lattes.  I'm slightly addicted to hazelnut lattes - they suck up a lot of my money and a lot of times I fail to bring my own mug and end up with more waste than I'd like to admit.  I'm also probably too embarrassed to even figure out exactly how much I spend on them throughout the year.  But, I'll hopefully be able to kick that habit with this new substitute.  I've given up on buying them before and can hopefully do it again...or at least cut back.  

Anyway, the reason I purchased hazelnuts in the first place, was not to combat this addiction, but to make the granola that I read about on Food in Jars, a blog about...well...food in jars.   It's almost backpacking/camping season again (finally!), so I want to figure out some good trail recipes.  And for those of you who are hardcore backpackers and are thinking to yourselves, "any season is backpacking season,"  well, not for me!

Then, this morning, I used my new immersion blender, which I bought off Amazon for half the price with the groupon.  Willis had been wanting an immersion blender for the longest time, because it is such a pain to blend hot soups in the food processor.  If you've never tried this, don't.  The soup explodes everywhere, so if you want to avoid a Mt. Vesuvius of soup you either have to blend in small doses or purchase an immersion blender.

OK, so this morning, I used the immersion blender on some half & half to put in my coffee.  Then I ate some granola, then I thought, "I wonder how hard it is to make my own hazelnut syrup to add to this coffee?"  After a quick google search - the answer: not hard at all!

Hazelnut Syrup Recipe(suitable for coffee)

1/2 cup of Finely Chopped Hazelnuts
2 tbsp of Butter
3/4 cup of Syrup (preferably maple)

Making the Hazelnut Syrup:
Melt the butter in a frying pan and toss the hazelnuts in. Cook them until they turn light brown. Add the syrup and heat thoroughly. (Do not boil.) For a stronger favor, add 3/4 cup of finely chopped hazelnuts.

While the syrup is still warm, place a metal strainer over a bowl and pour the syrup into the strainer to seperate the hazlenuts from the syrup. Store the syrup in an air-tight container, preferrably a glass bottle with a twist cap. This syrup will last for up to 4 months.


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