No, No, Nutella

Nutella is obviously a favorite. It's like happiness slathered on top of home cooked goodyness. I know, I am a little biased and completely unreasonable when it come to Nutella. So as I stared at my Costco sized container of Nutella last fall, my eyes rested on the ingredient list. Bah! Preservatives. Yuck. And if you have every followed my thinking about making your own hummus, cheese, or pesto, you know where this story ends. Yes, at Jungle Jims, purchasing a bag of fresh hazelnuts and snobby baking cocoa (in the dutch alcove). I rationalized my actions by calling it a family event! The kids have an equal fondness of the stuff (I must admit that I tend to sneak it so I don't have to share, I know, bad mother, bad mother), and they like pressing the buttons on the food processor, so that idea was semi valid. The heart wrenching thing was that I broke my food processor.... making hummus at that! Everyday I would open my fridge and see those cheery little hazelnuts reminding me of good ideas lost in the world of broken technology. Guilt, yes guilt! Hazelnuts are not cheap little nuts and snobby cocoa is well... snobby. I eventually put the nuts in the freezer and walked away.

Cue chimes, unwrap new food processor blender combo and BAM! back in business. Bad news. Hazelnuts go bad, really bad, which equates gross, smelly and completely inedible nutella like spread. The process was still great and it was educational to oil the nuts, even if the oil was rancid. I guess this just means that I get to go back to Jungle Jims (jungle jims is this amazing smorgasbord of delicious foods and spices, honestly, a Cincinnati treasure), as painful as that might be.