Among the strange and frivolous things people talk about over coffee

Today somebody brought a glass of Nutella to work. I always thought it was a German product, probably because everybody in my childhood always came back from the German border with two things, namely Beer and a giant Nutella jar. Now I know Beer is not always from Germany, but I guess I never really figured out where Nutella came from.

In an Italian lesson long ago we had a text called, all Italians have a nutella story (Tutti gli italiani hanno un storia di Nutella (I think it was called in Italian), where different people told obscure stories from their childhood including Nutella. This was the first clue.

Entering the information age, people know more and more about things that is not important to know, so over coffee my colleague and I talked about Nutella, finding that it was actually very old, and from north of Italy - Piedmont. Where a Pastry maker - faced with chocolate shortage due to the WII - created this wonder out of hassle nuts, which is plenty in north of Italy.

Actually he started by making a kind of a Nutella bar, which were supposed to be sliced and put on top of bread. But the nice conscientious Mr. Pietro Ferrero soon discovered that the kids forgot to put it on bread, and ate it directly, and he therefore made into a paste which could be spread onto bread. Here in Italy, it got so popular that many shops starting a service which they called "smearing" that meant that you (kids, grownups ect) could come and buy a piece of bread with Nutella spread on top.

In the beginning the wonder was called "Gianduja" after a famous carnival figure from those parts. When it was turned into the paste it turned into "super crema gianduja" and it wasn't before in the sixties, that the catchy name arrived...

When I was a child, we had Nutella from time to time never for long, but it happened. Either way, I think my mum outsmarted the maker, because she figured out how to eat it without bread, even after it came as a paste.

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Here is a nice thing to know (taken from the FAQ of www.nutellausa.com)

I like to eat Nutella out of the jar with a spoon. Is that OK?
While we agree that the creamy, chocolaty, hazelnut taste of Nutella is
delicious all by itself, we suggest not to "double dip," as it reduces the shelf life of the product.

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Anyway, the thing about breaks is that they should be exactly that. A break away from what you were doing. Hope you had a nice break away from what you were doing. if you need more break, I suggest finding another subject to surf...

(I also hope it is pretty obvious, that my only source of information is the American Nutella site, with all this positive talk. ( well and the Nutella knowledge of my Colleague))