Hazelnut Harvest

Hazelnuts, known in France as noisettes, are hardly an important ingredient in Norman cuisine, though I’ve never understood why. Undisciplined, tangled, a beautiful delicate green, wild hazelnut bushes that grow into tall trees line most country roads and lanes in the region. The famous bocage of Normandy—the wicked, thick hedgerows surrounding tiny fields that kept American tanks from getting through during WWII—are composed of many plants, including the wild hazelnut.

I think of them now because the long, fluffy, celadon green catkins, precursors to leaf and fruit, are hanging from the trees already. I love these funny little things that, when you take them in your hand, have no discernable weight. When they get dry, later in the month, you can crush them with a satisfying crunch.

In my back courtyard I have a grand hazelnut tree that began as a wiry little shoot more than ten years ago. I can see how the plant could be a pest, but to me it’s a treasure, surrounded by mystery. One wintry day its snaky branches will be bare; the next, they’ll be dripping with catkins and spring will be on its way. Sometimes I don’t even notice their arrival, as happened this year. I was carefully slicing cabbage in preparation for braising it with garlic and thyme. Something caused me to look up through the long skylights at one side of the kitchen, a cloud floating over the wintry sun, no doubt. There they were, dancing in the breeze, hundreds of catkins on the long branches of the tree.

When it comes to hazelnuts in the Norman kitchen, though, they are seldom seen. Not entirely—they’ll make their way into a cake or a cookie, but far less often than their cousin, the almond, which grows in abundance in France, although far away in Provence. Hazelnuts here grow in profusion, and they are parallel in quality to the famous Italian tonde gentile hazelnuts of Piedmont, where an enterprising gentleman invented Nutella, a cocoa-spiked hazelnut spread. Here, where they could be harvested by the ton for free, they are virtually ignored by the local residents.

Not by me. I find the hazelnut magical. After the catkins come heart-shaped, translucent leaves of a green I cannot describe except with the word lovely. Then the nuts form, usually two-by-two, encased in a frilled, velvety basket that holds them as the nutmeats fatten and the shell hardens. My tree produces few—maybe five or six kilos a year—and perhaps that low yield explains why they aren’t commercially exploited.

By August the nuts, while still immature, begin to fall from the tree. At the same time, the little épicerie fine, or specialty grocery, next door to me begins selling hazelnuts from Italy at the same stage of ripeness. They’re popular as an aperitif, served in their pretty little casings. All that’s necessary is to peel back that casing, crack the not-quite-hard shell, and pull out the ivory colored nut—it isn’t even old enough for the skin to be brown. Under that ivory skin—which I remove—is a juicy, crisp, delicately flavored delicacy. As long as those immature nuts fall, we eat them.

By September, the nuts are mature and they don’t just fall, they hail. Anyone going out in the courtyard would do well to wear a hard hat, and on some days, the ground is covered. Walking across the courtyard can be risky business, like walking on marbles.

When the nuts hit the ground, their casings, which have now turned brown and crisp, split and fall off. What’s left is the hazelnut we all know. They still need to dry, though I like them at this penultimate stage too. They retain some juice, and their flavor is mild and haunting.

To take them to their final stage of maturity, I put them in baskets and set them atop the furnace, or outside in the sun if there is any, where they slowly dry to firm crispness. They need cracking and toasting to remove their skins, which can be bitter. These are on-and-off winter activities, stimulated by the desire for hazelnut yeast bread, light-as-air hazelnut cake, sweet and salty cocoa nuts and homemade “nutella”.

All in all, my hazelnut tree—and those that line the roads of Normandy—provide beauty, and a certain gentle entertainment. Above all, though, they provide elegant flavor, as in the recipe for hazelnut cake that follows.

 

HAZELNUT CAKE FROM TURIN

GATEAU AUX NOISETTES DE TURIN

8 to 10 servings

This cake has a pure hazelnut flavor. The best nuts to use are either small wild hazelnuts or, if you can get them, the tonde gentile from Piedmont, in Italy. Otherwise, use whatever hazelnuts you can find, and be sure to toast them first to bring out all their flavor.

6 large eggs, separated, at room temperature

6 tbsp (75 g) vanilla sugar

1-2/3 cups (250 g) whole hazelnuts, toasted and skins removed

Pinch fine sea salt

1 tbsp confectioner’s sugar (optional)

 

1. Preheat oven to 350° (180° C). Butter and lightly flour a 9-inch (22.5cm) springform pan.

2. In a large bowl whisk egg yolks and 4 tbsp of vanilla sugar by hand or with electric mixer until thick and pale yellow.

3. Place hazelnuts in a food processor with 1 tbsp of vanilla sugar and process until finely ground.

4. In another large bowl, whisk egg whites and salt by hand or with electric mixer until foamy. Add remaining 1 tbsp vanilla sugar and whisk until they form soft peaks.

5. Mix ground nuts into egg yolk mixture, then fold in one-quarter of egg whites. Carefully fold in remaining egg whites and turn batter into prepared pan.

6. Bake cake in center of oven until puffed and golden, about 30 min. Cool for 10 minutes on wire rack. Remove side of pan and cool cake completely before removing it from bottom of pan.

7. Just before serving, sift confectioner’s sugar over cake if desired.

 

Susan Herrmann Loomis teaches cooking classes in Normandy and Paris. The latest of her nine books is Cooking at Home on Rue Tatin (William Morrow, 2006). Susan’s website

Originally published in the April 2010 issue of France Today.

For more food stories and French recipes