Team Nutella Taste Test

After learning that Nutella is different around the world, we decided to purchase various sorts of the Italian-invented hazlenut spread from throughout Europe to compare to the American version, as a fun little game at the end of our Euro project.

Wikipedia has an interesting chart that compares Nutella ingredients around the world. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nutella) The main differences are cocoa content, milk content, and the type of oil used to make the spread. These variations inevitably lead to an assortment of nuances between flavors, smells, appearances, and viscosities.

In this test, we tried 5 types of Nutella from the following countries:
Belgium, Switzerland (Made in Austria), United States of America (Made in Canada), Germany, and Sweden.

8 subjects participated in the test, and were asked to evaluate each spread based on it's colour, scent, and flavor.  The Nutella was presented on numbered metal spoons. Each number corresponded to a country. The test subjects (us!) were unaware of the origin of each Nutella sample.

The evaluations recorded by each subject are detailed in the three charts below, under “Appearnace”, “Scent”, and “Flavour”.  Here are the results:

Appearance

	Lex	Jo	MoJo	Mary	Anne	Denise	Erik	Mandy
Belgium	Similar to USA (shiny)	?	(3)	Dark	Dry	Lightest (5)	Lightest (1)	Very oily (5)
Switzerland	Most viscous looking	Light	Lightest (5)	Milky	Ok	(2)	(3)	Better than 1 (3)
USA	Similar to Belgium (shiny)	Brown between	(4)	Medium dark	Yum	(4)	(4)	Slightly more than 1 (4)
Germany	Matte brown	Thick, dark	(2)	Dark	Dry	(3)	(2)	(2)
Sweden	Darkest	Dark	Darkest (1)	Very dark	Looks luscious	Darkest (1)	(1)	(1)

Scent

	Lex	Jo	MoJo	Mary	Anne	Denise	Erik	Mandy
Belgium	Doesn't smell much	No smell	More nuts		Shit	(5)	(5)	Weak (5)
Switzerland	Little chocolate smell, mostly nuts	Nutty			Some OK	(2)	(4)	(3)
USA	Light smell, chocolate and hazelnut	No smell			Not great	(4)	(3)	(4)
Germany	Strong nut scent	Slightly more scent than USA	Second highest chocolate scent		OK	(3)	(2)	(2)
Sweden	Chocolately	Chocolate scent	Chocolatiest		Yum	(1)	(1)	(1)

Flavour

	Lex	Jo	MoJo	Mary	Anne	Denise	Erik	Mandy
Belgium	Not sweet (5)	OK...but...	Most nuts by taste and smell (4)	Blah	Not so hot	(4)	(4)	(5)
Switzerland	Similar to Germany, nutty, not too sweet FAV (1)	Best (1)	Least taste (american?)	Strong and powerful hazelnuts (FAV)	Tasteless	(5)	(5)	(3)
USA	Good! (4)	Good mix choc & nut. (2)	(3)	Nutty and thick	Tasteless	(3)	(3)	(4)
Germany	Very viscous, vanillay FAV (1)	American (Wrong!) No nut flavor. Not great	2nd best, 2nd darkest (2)	Bland	Second best, very sweet	(2)	(1)	(2)
Sweden	Very sweet & chocolatey, not much nut (3)	Similar to Germany	Best (Sweden?) RIGHT (1)	Super chocolatey taste! (OTHER FAV)	Amazing (1)	(1)	(2)	(1)

We unanimously agreed that the Swedish Nutella was the darkest. The majority of us found it the most appealling, except for suject 1 who prefered the matte-brown colour of the German Nutella. All testers who commented on the scent also agreed that the Swedish Nutella smelled the chocolatiest.

Here's the most important part: Taste
Belgium: Didn't fare well. Ranked 4^th and 5^th place out of the 5 Nutellas, amongst all participants.
Switzerland: Mixed feelings! Several of us chose this one as their favorite, and several chose it as their least favorite
USA: Ranked mid-way between the 5 Nutellas
Germany: Relatively good results, several of 1^st and 2^nd places! One person found it bland though

Sweden: When the results are averaged, this is the favorite!

So here's the verdict:
American Nutella isn't as bad as lots of people make it out to be. Swedish Nutella is the most chocolately. and people who prefer a less sweet, and more nutty spread will tend to like German and Swiss Nutella the best, (although the German Nutella ranked better than the Swiss one). Belgian Nutella: of course, it's still Nutella, but it's the least favorite out of all 5 types tested. Belgium loses! But they win for their waffles...