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Today Is National Nougat Day

Mar 26, 2016

National Nougat Day is observed each year on March 26th. This food holiday is in celebration of a soft and chewy or sometimes hard and crunchy candy.

Break open the center of certain candy bars and you will find a nougat center.

Made by whipping egg whites together and adding honey or sugar, roasted nuts and sometimes candied fruit, some say nougat has been a sweet treat ancient Rome. Enjoyed both as a candy all on its own or paired with chocolate or other flavorings.

Recipes can range from the more traditional made with almonds and honey to those with hints of citrus.

In Italy, it is called torrone. In Spain, a nougat is called turrón. The United States has a version made with corn syrup called divinity.

There are three basics kinds of nougats:

1.   White nougat – made with beaten egg whites and honey.
2.   Brown nougat – made without egg whites and has a firmer, often crunchy texture.
3.   Viennese or German nougat – chocolate and nut praline

In the United States, the “nougat” used as an ingredient in many modern candy bars is different from the traditional recipes. Now it is made of a mixture of sucrose and corn syrup aerated with a whipping agent such as egg white or hydrolyzed soy protein or gelatin. It is the preferred and often used ingredient of large candy companies because it is inexpensive to make and used as a filler.

Varieties of nougat are found in:
3 Musketeers, Mars, Snickers, Milky Way, Zero, Salted Nut Rolls, Reese’s Fast Break, Reese’s Whipps, Baby Ruth, and others.