Cervione hazelnut ✦

Noisette de Cervione

What it is

Corsica's hazelnut groves had nearly gone when growers around Cervione replanted a single old cultivar in the last decades of the twentieth century, and the whole protected area still turns out a fraction of what one Piedmont valley does. The nuts are dried in moving air rather than in a kiln, which is why the kernel keeps a woody, almost resinous edge that hot-dried nuts lose.

In the kitchen

Its edge is aromatic rather than sweet, so pair it with brocciu, chestnut or a bitter honey — milk chocolate flattens it entirely. Roast it lighter than a Piedmont nut: 140 °C and no colour.

Goes with

Brocciu Chestnut Chestnut honey Fig Myrtle Goat cheese

Same species

Fresh green hazelnut Gianduja Hazelnut Hazelnut flour Hazelnut oil Piedmont hazelnut

In season alongside

Pine bolete Beechnut Bronte pistachio Bronze bolete Burgundy truffle Crowberry

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