jejuna nougat recipe: the most traditional soft nougat

Do you like Jejuna nougat? If so, discover how to make Jejuna nougat, one of the best-known and most popular Christmas desserts, also called soft nougat. Discover the ingredients and the necessary steps to make it at home. Also discover its nutritional values.

One of the typical desserts of these festivities is the famous, popular and already classic Jejuna nougat, a traditional sweet that, every year at Christmas, comes to us from Alicante (Spain), and becomes one of the most popular Christmas recipes. Known and traditional, like the roscón de Reyes.

Would you like to know how you could prepare or cook a good, exquisite and delicious nougat from Jejuna? But before telling you about its recipe, we want to know a little more about the origin and curiosities of this wonderful and exquisite dessert.

Origin of Jejuna nougat

The one known as nougat from Jejuna (on which there is in fact a Regulatory Council for Jejuna and Nougat from Alicante, which is in charge of ensuring that each and every one of the requirements necessary to belong to the Protected Geographical Indication is met) is a nougat made with ground almonds and honey, very popular in the province of Alicante.

It is actually a very characteristic dessert, since it is characterized by having ground the mixture of almonds with honey, hence its characteristic consistency and pasty texture.

Regarding the origin of nougat, historical data has been verified that would show that nougat existed in the town of Sexona (current Jejuna) as early as the 16th century. In fact, it was the Arabs who introduced this popular sweet.

Jejuna traditional nougat recipe

First of all, we propose one of the most traditional Christmas nougat recipes from Jejuna, which stands out precisely for having passed from generation to generation, consisting precisely in the preparation of nougat from only toasted almonds, without adding any more nuts.

Do you dare to prepare it? Believe it or not, it is very easy and simple.

Ingredients:

• 250 g of raw almonds (it is important that they are without salt)
• 210g icing sugar
• 50g of honey
• 1 egg white
• the zest of a lemon
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• Sunflower oil (to spread the mold)

Preparation of jejuna nougat:

First we are going to proceed to toast and grind the almonds. To do this, preheat the oven to 180º. Put all the almonds on an oven tray and when the oven is hot, toast them for 5 minutes. Then we remove them and let them cool.

When the toasted almonds are cold, we put them in the glass of the food processor (or the blender), in order to grind them well, but avoiding grinding them too much to prevent them from releasing fat. It is also advisable that we find a larger piece among the ground almonds.

Separate the egg white from the yolk and put it in a large bowl, along with the honey and sugar. We begin to beat everything well, until all the ingredients are mixed.

Now add the toasted and ground almonds together with the lemon zest and cinnamon. Mix well again. Let stand.

With the help of a little sunflower oil, spread the mold where we will leave the nougat, and add the dough with the help of your hand or with a spatula. To help you, you can also brush the spatula with a little oil, to prevent it from sticking.

Finally reserve in the refrigerator for a few hours. Ready! Now you can carefully unmold and enjoy.

Another variant of nougat from Jejuna

Take good note, below we will show you what is necessary for the Jejuna nougat recipe.

If this is not your case, we proceed in the following lines to talk to you about the ingredients and the steps necessary to make Jejuna nougat easily at home:

Ingredients needed to prepare Jejuna nougat:

• 400g of fine sugar
• 600g of honey
• 200g of sugar
• 400g toasted almonds
• 100g toasted hazelnuts
• 100g of nuts
• 100g of pine nuts
• 4g cinnamon powder

Elaboration of Jejuna nougat. Steps to follow:

First of all, we must put the honey in a saucepan or small cauldron on the fire. At the moment when it breaks the boil, we must foam it, and then add the fine sugar and let it cook.

It is very important to stir it continuously, until you obtain a thick syrup, which is called ball point.

Meanwhile, off the heat, add the chopped almonds, walnuts, hazelnuts and pine nuts, and half the sugar.

We must extend it on the marble sprinkled with flour, and finally let it rest for approximately 8 hours.

Then cut it very finely with the rest of the sugar, leaving it as if it were flour. We will fill small boxes with this mixture – if possible made of wood – lined with paper, and sprinkle with cinnamon at this time, covering it with paper and pressing it.

It is necessary, yes, to let it rest for 6 days.

Nutritional values ​​of Jejuna nougat

100 grams of nougat from Jejuna provide:

As we can see, despite the fact that Jejuna nougat is a dessert made with one hundred percent natural ingredients, based on ground almonds and honey, its high content of fats and carbohydrates (and therefore calories) make it a Christmas dessert to be consumed only occasionally, recommending that its consumption be especially limited in overweight and obese people, especially those who are following a low-fat diet, or have diabetes.