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Mmmm, hazelnuts. Hazelnuts ground up and used in fillings for truffles, cakes, ice cream, chocolate spreads like Nutella. Mmmuh.

Hazelnut products aren’t too popular around here (defined as California, United States), which is sad. It’s more difficult to find things like hazelnut pastes and butters. One time I purchased some hazelnut butter, I think it was Kettle brand. Very disappointing: full of nut skins (hey, they remove the skins off nuts for peanut butter and almond butter; I expect no lesser standards) and gritty, not creamy.

A couple years ago, though, I found a rather expensive (at Whole Foods, unsurprisingly) jar of hazelnut praline spread from Spain, produced by Matíz in Andalucía. (Praline means caramelized sugar added, in contrast to the usually unsweetened nut butters.) More recently I’ve found the same available online, although not quite as outrageously priced. And even more recently, I learned about a New York company, American Almond, who produces hazelnut and pistachio pastes (in addition to almond paste) under its Love’n Bake brand. Interestingly, the domestic Love’n Bake stuff is more expensive than the imported Matíz stuff. Go figure.

Anyhow, I got myself a couple jars of the Matíz spread. What to do? Make frosting for cakes, of course! (If anyone has used the Love’n Bake pastes, I’d love hear your thoughts on its quality.)

This frosting turned out to be more like a ganache than a buttercream. Because of its oiliness (ground up nuts, y’know), I had to add more confectioner’s sugar to it compared with the mocha and chocolate frostings. Since this makes the frosting stiffer, I added more cream to make it spreadable.

Yields a whole lot, more than enough for a two-layer 9 inch cake.

The unavoidable next question: What’s the best way to use this praline spread to make hazelnut ice cream…?

Ingredients

• 1 cup hazelnut praline spread; this was the approximate amount from 1 jar of the Matíz brand, which weighed 9.8 ounces (280 grams).
• 4 tablespoons (1/2 stick) unsalted butter
• 1/2 to 3/4 cup heavy whipping cream
• a pinch of salt
• 6 ounces confectioner’s sugar, sifted

Method

1. Over low heat in a sauce pan, stir the hazelnut praline spread, butter, 1/2 cup of cream and salt until melted and free of lumps. Pour into a food processor.
2. Add the confectioner’s sugar to the food processor, then whirl until smooth. If you notice oil still separating out from the mixture, add more confectioner’s sugar. I also added another 1/4 cup of cream so that it wouldn’t be too stiff to spread, but add more if you want a softer frosting. It does firm up more as it cools.
3. Spread over layers of cake, or cupcakes.