When I have great ambitions to re-create a favourite food product at home, it usually takes the right moment of inspiration to push me along. Or, it simply takes remembering to snap the photos before the husband and I eat the entire batch (such was the case with my vegan cookie recreation from Zephyr Café…doh).
This time, my inspiration came from spotting a huge bag of raw hazelnuts at Costco. I knew it was time to try and re-create my beloved Rawtella!
Rawtella is just about one of the best spreads I’ve ever tasted. It’s made with raw hazelnuts, coconut sugar, and cacao nibs. My favourite is their coffee flavour which includes ground coffee beans creating a super crazy intense chocolate flavour. Ohhhh yeaaaaa.
Instead of using raw hazelnuts, I roasted them because I wanted to remove the somewhat bitter-tasting skins. Roast the hazelnuts at 300F for about 13-15 minutes. As you can see, the skins darken and begin to loosen in the oven:
Now all you do is grab an old damp tea towel. Key word being OLD because this makes a huge mess! Place the roasted nuts on the damp towel and wrap the towel up as shown below.
Rub the hazelnuts vigorously with the tea towel to remove the skins.
After a couple minutes, it should look like this:
At this point, remove the nuts without skins and place them in the processor. Keep rubbing the others, but it’s ok if all the skins don’t come off. Mine never do!!
Here is a breakdown of how the hazelnuts should look at various stages of processing (click to enlarge):
Yes, it took a full 15-20 minutes for my processor to get the nutella as smooth as I wanted it. After you add the coconut sugar, it thickens up a lot, but if you keep processing and scraping down the sides, it will heat up and thin out. Patience is key here. I know, I know, it’s hard when you just want to grab a spoonful of your homemade nutella. I didn’t say this would be easy.
But, you’ll be rewarded with a silky, intensely chocolate mocha latte frappe espresso (or something) knock-off of the store-bought stuff at a fraction of the cost. It probably goes without saying, but this would make a lovely gift for that special chocolate-crazed someone! Aka, me & YOU!
Homemade Mocha Nutella
Inspired by Rawtella
Yield: 1 & 1/4 cup
Ingredients:
- 2 cups raw hazelnuts
- 1.5-2 tbsp coconut oil
- 1 tsp pure vanilla extract
- 1/2 cup coconut sugar
- 1.5 tbsp cocoa powder
- 1/4-1/2 tsp espresso powder (I used 1/2 tsp)
- 1/4 tsp fine grain sea salt, or to taste
1. Preheat oven to 300F and roast the hazelnuts for 13-14 minutes, watching closely, especially if you aren’t sure of your actual oven temperature. When ready, the skins will have darkened and some will have come loose.
2. Place nuts into the centre of an old damp tea towel. Cover it up like a purse and rub the nuts for a couple minutes to loosen the skins. Pick out the “naked” nuts and place into processor. Repeat towel rubbing for the rest. It’s ok if all of the skins don’t come off. Add the rest to processor.
3. Process the nuts, stopping to scrape down the bowl every minute or so. After 9-10 minutes of processing, add in the coconut oil and process until smooth. This will help thin it out a lot and I don’t recommend skipping the oil.
4. Now add in the rest of the ingredients slowly and keep processing and scraping down the bowl for another 5-10 minutes, or until silky smooth. It took me 15-20 minutes total processing. The sugar will thicken up the spread significantly, but keep processing and the heat will smooth it out once again.
5. Store in an air-tight container in the fridge. It will harden slightly when chilled. Simply bring it to room temp or heat it to soften.
A few notes:
– Coconut sugar, coconut oil, vanilla, hazelnuts, and cocoa powder were all purchased at Costco. Espresso powder was purchased at my regular grocery store in the coffee section.
– I assume you can sub another sugar in place of the coconut sugar. Add it to taste. I don’t recommend using a liquid sweetener like maple syrup because I find it can produce a strange thick texture in nut butters.
– You can probably sub the coconut oil for another light tasting oil like grapeseed oil. You can also use hazelnut oil for obvious reasons. I am leery about using extra virgin olive oil since it has quite a powerful flavour. Use at your own risk…
– Like all homemade nut butters, I don’t recommend making them without a heavy-duty food processor. I use a 12-cup Cuisinart and it works great for nut butters.
Want to know a secret? I don’t think I’ve ever had actual Nutella before – (just Rawtella as an adult). Is that weird? I don’t find Nutella is as big here in Canada as it seems to be in the US (or maybe I just lived under a rock as a kid).
I made this a few days ago with a couple of changes (1/3 sucanat instead of coconut sugar, and more cocoa) and it’s delectable! The sugar in my batch didn’t melt, and i’m glad it didn’t because it gave it a nice crunch. (almost like a ferrero rocher) Thanks for the recipe!
After “failing” to improvise on homemade Nutella (largely due to a lack of patience), I followed your directions and it was a complete success! Thanks for this great recipe!
I wanna try this so badly! Do you know if it’s possible to use stevia instead of coconut sugar? :-)
I haven’t tried it but let me know if you do…I can’t see why it wouldn’t work (but I am no expert with stevia)
How long do you keep this in the fridge for (as far as how long it would take to go bad)?
Hi Andrea, I think it will last for at least 3 weeks if I recall…perhaps longer. Enjoy!
That sounds lovely! Though I like Nutella, I always found it a tad too sweet for my taste, but in a homemade version you can decide how sweet you want it. Good idea to add espresso powder to enhance the chocolaty flavor.
It’s a pity that hazelnuts (cheap in Europe) are so expensive here in the US, fortunately Trader Joe offers them in good quality for a reasonable price.
Hmm is is pretty big in Canada or at least in Montreal lol maybe it’s the French background. My roommate’s from Alberta and she was only exposed to Nutella once she went to France. It’s a must at any crepe joint around here and standard breakfast fare, for the decadent at least. Commercials run here touting it as a great breakfast choice for your kids, which is so nuts but maybe better than fruit loops right? In high school I had jars of it in my locker and my friend and I would scoop up spoon fulls between classes. I did make this and am waiting for it to cool down in hopes that the hazelnut flavour dies down a bit. I’d really prefer for the chocolate flavour to overpower the nut butter. Maybe this is closer to what rawtella tastes like (which I haven’t tried)… I think using cashews as a sub would probably be amazing.
Hey looks delish! Is there a good sub for coconut sugar? Couldnt find any :/
Thanks for sharing the recipe :D
For sure, feel free to sub any granulated sugar you’d like.
Hi! I have been looking for instant espresso forever! Where did you find that? :)
Hey Heather, I found it in a regular grocery store in the coffee section – the espresso powder is usually in very small compact bags so it’s VERY easy to miss!!
So the result will look lite on the picture or is that something else made with your “rawtella”? It looks so “liquidy” (and yummy)…
Can I make the Nutella with a different nut? I don’t like the flavor of hazelnuts, but I love most other nuts and always have them on hand. Also can i leave out the espresso powder as i don’t like the flavor of coffee either )I don’t drink it, never have). Would I need to replace the espresso powder with more cocoa powder os something else? Thanks for your help. I love your recipes and your website is awesome.
Tootz
There is now a GIANT 5 LB jar of Nutella (the original) at Costco (Richmond BC). Several of us stopped in the aisle to take pictures. It wouldn’t fit in my suitcase so I couldn’t bring it back to New Zealand with me, but oh I so wanted to! What a prezzie to find under the Xmas tree.
I am Italian, well, Sicilian, :) and grew up on Nutella, haven’t had it though since adapting my eating Clean lifestyle, this WILL be my next obsession!!! Thank you!
Adopting*** pardon the typo, I was hypnotized by this delisciousness! haha :-)
Amazing healthy dessert! I think I will give it a shot!
Thanks for sharing this recipes!
Regards
Thank you for the Homade Mocha Nutella smoothie can’t wait to make it happy new yrs Angela:)
Oh my goodness….. I just made half a recipe in my Nutribullet because I wasn’t sure how it would turn out. I couldn’t put the spatula down….licked most of it away :). The smoky taste of the roasted hazelnuts comes through. The cocoa powder was just enough. I omitted the espresso because of my kids. It is one of the best nut butter/spread I have ever tasted, and I experiment a lot. Thank you so much!
I made the Rawtella at Christmas as gifts and my family really enjoyed it. At home when I make some, it “disappears” really quickly! I’ve noticed I get better results with a food processor than with my Vitamix.
Hi Angela,
I’m curious as to why you chose to do this in your food proc instead of the vitamix. Do you think it would be creamier faster in the vitamix? Maybe too frustrating to get it out?
Very excited to try this this weekend!
Thanks!
I just made this in my mini Kenwood food processor and it took less than 10 mins. Very tasty, cut down half the sugar and it was sweet enough! Thanks for another brilliant recipe Angela (:
Made this over the weekend and was so surprised at how easy AND delicious it was. I like it even more than store-bought Nutella, it has way more flavor. Thank you so much for sharing this recipe! :-)
Thanks for this recipe- it’s amazingly yummy! … so yummy I even considered licking the sharp food processor blade to avoid wasting any, but resisted :) I recently discovered that if you put the roasted hazelnuts in a tupperware container with the lid on and shake it, the skins fall off and separate really easily!