Nutella’s squat, oddly shaped jar has become a culinary icon around the world thanks to its compelling richness and creaminess. Chocolate and hazelnut spread kept inside. But, although the marriage of chocolate and hazelnut seems as natural as salt and pepper or bread and butter, its true story is not so simple. It begins with the spread’s progenitor, a chocolate-hazelnut treat called giandua.*
*Also sometimes spelled “Gendoja”. Both versions are pronounced “john-DOO-ya” and refer to the same product.
Early history of Gianduia
The story of Gianduvia’s birth is often spread over product labels and woven into pop history accounts of related products, including Nutella. In large part, that’s because it’s a compelling story — wartime desperation, economic strife, and the triumph of industrial ingenuity. It begins in Turin, Italy at the turn of the 19th century, and is almost certainly full of lies.
What most historians can agree on is that by the early 1800s, Turin had long held the distinction of being the chocolate capital of Europe, its cocoa-based products serving as delicacies across the continent. She was famous. But by 1806, its importance was fading. Napoleon Bonaparte and his French Grande Armée were marching on conquering Europe in the name of social enlightenment. Tensions between France and Britain had reached a fever pitch, culminating in a series of naval blockades and trade embargoes. In late autumn, Napoleon imposed the Continental System, an extensive blockade that prevented all trade between the island kingdom and any country under the emperor’s thumb, including the pair of states and city-states that would soon become will be united under the name “Italy”.
In the case of Turin, one particular change transformed its coveted chocolate industry. Britain, a dominant power in maritime trade, was an important conduit for the flow of cacao between Mesoamerica and Europe. Under the blockade, Turin found its main source of cocoa cut off.
From here, the actual legend of gianduia gets a bit more complicated. Many claim thatUnable to take advantage of Britain’s access to cocoa beans, Turin’s chocolatiers needed a quick solution to increase their supply and stay in business. The surrounding area of Piedmont, with its abundant hazelnut trees, proved to be just the ticket. When ground, hazelnuts take on the texture of cocoa powder, meaning the nuts can be used to spread cocoa into a thick, ganache-like confection. In this version of the story, the chocolatiers of Turin boosted the local industry, using their resources to create a brilliant new product—one that has remained popular for centuries.
As attractive as this narrative may be, there are reasons to question it. Some people point out that at that time chocolate was eaten in liquid form rather than thick paste or solid bars. Others argue that Turin chocolatiers would lack the powerful technology needed to grind enough hazelnuts to make gianduia an affordable product on a large scale, let alone save the entire industry.
Although it is true that chocolate was first introduced to North America and Europe as a Mesoamerican medicinal drink, and that the cocoa press—the machine that made solid chocolate readily available—was not invented until 1828, There is ample evidence that so-called “food” chocolate was established in Europe in the mid-17th century. The real history of chocolateMichael and Sophie point to examples of culinary experiments with chocolate in Italy dating back to the 1680s, and records of “chocolate eating” from 18th-century France. The Marquis de Sade, known for his love of sweets, wrote to his wife from prison in the early 1800s, begging her to send care packages filled with chocolate: “… halves of chocolate pastilles. Pound boxes, large chocolate biscuits, vanilla pastilles au chocolat, and chocolat en tablettes d’ordinaire [chocolate bars]”
But just because chocolate was only available in liquid form doesn’t mean that the continental system resulted in the creation of Giandoia, especially given that there was virtually no primary source connecting the two. Adds Even more important is the frequent rebuttal to this myth**—that the technology available at the time is unlikely to protect the tavern chocolatiers from the effects of their dwindling cocoa supply. Can use a lot of new confections.
** For an in-depth examination of the origin story of gianduia, visit the blog DallasFood, which offers an impressive, thorough research. 34 part series.
If Gyandoya was not created out of necessity, then what was the motivation for its creation? “My impression of the whole kingdom of Turin and Savoy is that it was completely dominated by France in the 18th and 19th centuries,” says Ken Albala, historian and director of the food studies program at the University of the Pacific in California. “I wouldn’t be surprised if you get the mix. [of chocolate and hazelnuts] in France before Italy.” Given Napoleon’s conquest of the region, this effect makes sense, and suggests that, at least in the early years, ganduia was produced at a slow and gradually increasing rate. It’s likely that chocolatiers quietly released the chocolate-hazelnut blend, and that its rise to popularity was a slow boil compared to the explosion of success suggested by the prevailing narrative.
But, of course, a story that credits an invading force with making chocolate confections a regional gem isn’t as stirring as one that portrays chocolatiers as ingenious conquerors who thrived in their trade despite the odds against them. Keep going. . And the impetus to reshape the gianduia narrative grew over time.
From Puppet to Candy: Gianduvia Gets a Name
By the mid-19th century, Italy was in the grip of the Risorgimento, a decades-long struggle to unite the peninsular states into a single kingdom. Italian nationalism was reaching its peak, and soon a revolutionary movement broke out in the emerging nation. In Piedmont, which had seen an 1821 revolt against its Austrian rulers, the environment was uniquely ripe for the construction of patriotic myths. And he took the form of a character called Gianduia, a wine-drinking, tracorn-wearing, womanizing peasant.
During the 19th century, Gianduia evolved from a traditional masked character in Italian commedia dell’arte into a puppet, and then into an elaborate political cartoon. His likeness was paraded in newspapers as the symbol of Turin, a jovial peasant mascot representing the capital of Piedmont.
It was at the Turin Carnival of 1865, just four years after Italy’s official unification, that the name Giandoia was first associated with a chocolate-hazelnut confection. There, during Carnival festivities, candies resembling Gianduia’s turcorn hat were distributed, possibly by someone dressed as the character. Although several chocolate companies, esp Cafrielclaim to have invented these confections, there is no evidence to support their claims. What is more widely agreed upon is that chocolate and hazelnut confections took the name giandviotti around this time. Naming the candy for the city’s greatest representative cemented it as a Turinese and now, after unification, as an Italian creation. Gianduia has since become synonymous with the combination of chocolate and hazelnut, and variations of the name are used to refer to chocolates, spreads and other confections.
The war resumed, and Nutella was born
After 90 years of creating their treats in relative peace, Turin’s chocolatiers faced uncertainty with the outbreak of World War II. As with Napoleon’s blockade, the outbreak of war brought with it food rationing, and cocoa supplies were once again severely limited. In 1946, Piedmontese pastry chef Pietro Ferrero, inspired by Giandviotti and its chocolaty ancestors, created a thick paste using hazelnuts, sugar, and what little cocoa was available. He shaped the paste into a loaf and named it “Giandujot”. But although its low proportion of expensive cocoa arose from the cost-consciousness of the war years, giandujot, so dense and thick that it had to be cut with a knife, was still too expensive for audiences.
In 1951, Ferrero revolutionized the industry with the first spreadable version of his sweet bread: “La Supercrema.” According to A BBC interview With Ferrero’s grandson, Giovanni Ferrero, the spread of La Supercrema meant that “a small amount goes a long way, helping to dispel the impression that chocolate was, as Giovanni says, , ‘Only very special occasions and celebrations like Christmas and Easter.”
The availability and affordability of La Supercrema made chocolate hazelnut a household staple throughout Italy. In 1961, Ferrero’s son, Michel, adjusted the recipe again, adding palm oil and scaling it up for mass production. The new spread was rebranded as Nutella, and in the early 1980s became a common breakfast and snack item throughout Europe, first in Asia and then in the United States. Nutella’s global dominance must have made Napoleon green with envy.
It is rare that a single vessel of anything can embody two centuries of social, political and historical change. But under that white lid is (potentially, at least) Napoleonic chivalry mixed with a touch of food. the ingenuity of the old Turin chocolatiers; and the creativity of his offspring Ferrero. Creamy, nutty and sweet, Nutella and its chocolate hazelnut brethren are war, progress and industrialization. Each spoonful spilled from the jar, each dollop that dripped from the warm crepe layers, pays tribute to the events that shaped her journey. And it should be, because without those moments of strife and tension, our wardrobes wouldn’t be the same.
February 2017