Wholesale Italian Chocolate with Hazelnut

Hazelnut and chocolate is what a lot of Italian confectionery is built around. Turin has its gianduia paste. Milan has praline workshops. The Po Valley has its truffle houses. Stock Italian chocolate with hazelnut and you give import grocers and gift-basket makers something they treat as its own little category. Foodservice buyers feel the same about it. We’d send you to the bulk candy catalog too, since other Italian and European sweets sit nicely beside hazelnut chocolate in a display.

Thirteen products sit here, from Maitre Truffout and Zaini. Monardo and Mangini are in as well, and so is Vergani. Some of these makers overlap with our wider Italian chocolate-with-nuts section. That’s on purpose. They’re the same producers behind Italian hazelnut chocolate. This page just skips the pistachio and other nuts. If you only want a hazelnut section, this is the shorter road there.

Start with Zaini. Zaini Gianduiotto Dark Gianduia Chocolate (Italian Bag) is the classic torpedo shape in dark gianduia, bittersweet and a little intense. Zaini Gianduiotto Hazelnut Chocolate Gold Foil Italy is the milk chocolate one in gold wrapping. Unwrapping a gold gianduiotto is a childhood habit in Italy, so Italian families here may well smile when they see it. Then there’s Zaini Cremino Layered Gianduia Chocolate Assortment. It’s stacked in layers of hazelnut paste. Each one’s a bit stronger than the last, so you taste the difference as you go. Domestic American candy rarely does that.

Mangini’s Noccioletto line is a whole hazelnut inside chocolate, and that’s it. You get Mangini Noccioletto Milk Chocolate Hazelnut, 90g Bags and Mangini Noccioletto Dark Chocolate Whole Hazelnut, Italy. The nut isn’t ground into cream. It stays whole, so the roasted flavor and the crunch both come through. We’d put these in a natural food store bin or by the deli counter, anywhere customers want a plain hazelnut chocolate and not a fussy filled piece.

Vergani Dark Chocolate Hazelnut Cream Pralines Italy goes the filled route, a dark chocolate shell around smooth hazelnut cream. The shell is a bit bitter, which balances the sweet cream. Of everything on this page it’s the most layered to eat. It would suit an import deli, or a premium gift basket. A coffee shop with a small chocolate case could try it as well.

Maitre Truffout has four, each a different take. Maitre Truffout Pralines, Hazelnut Cream and Cereal Crunch puts smooth cream next to crisp puffed cereal. Maitre Truffout Milk Chocolate Truffles, Hazelnut Filling is the cleaner truffle with a smooth center. The Maitre Truffout Pralines Duo with Hazelnut Cream comes in two parts. Last is Maitre Truffout Milk Chocolate Truffles, Hazelnut and Cereal, with the crunch tucked inside a soft truffle. That crunch is what we’d talk up. People notice it, and it makes the bag easier to finish and easier to reorder.

Monardo wraps things up with truffles and gianduiotti. Monardo Italian Gold Gianduiotto, Hazelnut Milk Chocolate is a gold-foil milk chocolate piece that sits right beside the Zaini gold one, with a different feel and a slightly different recipe. Monardo Italian Milk Chocolate Truffles, Cereal Hazelnut Cream is the cereal-hazelnut truffle. And Monardo Italian Hazelnut Pralines, Crema Nocciole Tartufo is a tartufo-style praline, shaped like a small truffle with hazelnut cream inside. It’s one of the better-looking ones in the lineup.

Units run 0.99 lb to 2 lb, in bulk and bagged packs. The Mangini 90g bags are ready for a peg hook or shelf. Larger bulk units fit self-serve bins and deli jars, or gift-basket filling. Colors stay mostly brown and gold. A display made only of these looks warm and a bit expensive, and it needs very little signage. The gold-foil pieces from Zaini and Monardo should shine in a fall gift display, because gold already says present.

Import grocers serving Italian-American or wider European families can build a hazelnut chocolate corner around the Zaini gianduiotti and Mangini Noccioletto, and mass-market candy won’t compete with it. A basket maker would reach for the gold-foil gianduiotto and the Vergani dark pralines first, since both look pricey sitting in a basket. Specialty food shops get 13 products, enough for a real section without crowding. A deli running European cheese could set these out by the cheese case as an impulse add-on. After dinner or as petit fours, a restaurant or hotel kitchen could serve them.

Keep it cool and dry, the same as any chocolate. Light and strong smells are worth keeping it away from as well. The cream-filled pieces and the gianduia like a steady room temperature, because a swing in heat can leave a white bloom or change the paste. Handled properly it keeps well, so buying ahead for a season is less of a gamble.

There’s no minimum, so small is fine. We’d start with the gold-foil gianduiotti from Zaini and Monardo plus the Mangini whole-hazelnut bags. Praline and truffle formats can wait until your customers know the category. Approved wholesale accounts get account pricing on bigger seasonal orders. We only ship within the US.

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