AI-generated image
Intxaursaltsa
Intxaursaltsa: Basque Christmas Eve walnut cream simmered with milk and cinnamon
On Christmas Eve in Gipuzkoa farmhouses, after the sea bream and before midnight, a pot of intxaursaltsa appears: walnuts slowly simmered in milk with sugar and cinnamon until thick and creamy. It was the sweet of the caseríos, made with walnuts from the farm's own trees, and it is eaten warm or cold from small bowls. A common mistake is letting it boil hard, which makes the milk catch and taste scorched; it should only murmur. Chef's tip: grind the walnuts in short pulses so they stay like coarse sand and don't turn into an oily paste.
- Total time
- 70 min
- Difficulty
- easy
- Serves
- 6
Ingredients
- 5 ½ oz shelled walnuts
- 1 cup water
- 4 ¼ cups whole milk
- 4 oz sugar
- 1 pinch ground cinnamon (optional)
Shop this recipe on Amazon
What you'll need
Spices & pantry
Fresh ingredients (1)
Links open Amazon in a new tab. As an Amazon Associate, WhatToEat.Today earns from qualifying purchases.
Method
0/4 doneStep 1: Pulse 5 ½ oz shelled walnuts in a food processor in short bursts until finely chopped like coarse sand.
3 minStep 2: Put the walnuts and 1 cup water in a heavy pan and simmer over a low heat for 10 minutes, stirring, until most of the water has gone and the nuts smell toasty.
10 minStep 3: Add 4 ¼ cups whole milk, 4 oz sugar and 1 cinnamon stick. Bring slowly to a gentle simmer, then cook on the lowest heat for 45–50 minutes, stirring every few minutes and scraping the bottom. It is ready when it has reduced by about a third and coats the back of a spoon like thin custard.
50 minStep 4: Remove the cinnamon. Serve warm, or pour into small bowls and chill for 3 hours, when it thickens further. Dust with a pinch of ground cinnamon if you like.
2 min
Nutrition per serving
- Calories
- 310 kcal
- Protein
- 9 g
- Carbs
- 30 g
- Fat
- 18 g
- Fibre
- 1 g
Nutrition values are estimates.
KrazyBadal
Good to know
- How long does intxaursaltsa take?
- About 70 minutes in total: 10 minutes to prepare and 60 minutes to cook.
- How many people does it serve?
- 6 as written. Change the servings above the ingredients and every amount scales to match.
- Is it vegetarian?
- Yes. It has no meat or fish.
- Is it gluten free?
- Yes, as written. Check the labels on stock, sauces and spice mixes, which sometimes contain gluten.
- Can I make it ahead?
- Yes. It keeps well, so you can cook it earlier in the day or the day before and reheat it.
- What can I use instead of shelled walnuts?
- Pecans or chocolate chips, same amount.
- What can I use instead of whole milk?
- Semi-skimmed milk with 1 tbsp cream per 240ml (1 cup).
Reviews
No reviews yet. Be the first to cook it.
Rate this recipe
Sign in to rate and review this recipe.
You might also like
Kartoshka cake
Soviet cafés and school canteens sold these knobbly brown 'potatoes' for a few kopecks, and they began as a thrifty way to use up sponge and biscuit trimmings at the bakery. Crumbs are bound with butter and sweetened condensed milk, flavoured with cocoa and vanilla, shaped into little potatoes, rolled in cocoa and finished with two dabs of pale butter cream for the sprouts. They are fudgy and dense like a brownie truffle, need no oven, and children love making them. Traditional bakers added a spoonful of rum, an optional extra for adult batches only; this version is alcohol-free with vanilla. The usual slip is coarse crumbs, which make the potatoes crack, so blitz them as fine as sand. Chef's tip: chill the shaped potatoes for at least 20 minutes so they hold their shape and slice cleanly.
Russian
Undu walalu
Walalu means bangles, and these dark, sticky rings of fried urad dal soaked in kithul treacle are a sweet that Sinhala families bring out for Avurudu and for special almsgivings, often made in large batches by an aunt known for her steady hand. A thick, fluffy paste of ground black gram is piped into loops and fried until crisp, then plunged straight into warm treacle, so the rings stay crunchy on the outside while drinking up the syrup. They taste a little like a darker, smokier jalebi, with a toffee finish from the palm treacle. Watery batter is what ruins them; it spreads into flat blobs, so grind the soaked dal with as little water as possible and beat it until light. This recipe uses no asafoetida, so it is naturally gluten free. Chef's tip: pipe the rings onto small squares of baking paper and lower them into the oil paper and all; the paper peels away in seconds.
Sri Lankan
Horchata de chufa
Horchata de chufa is the drink of Valencia's summer, sold ice-cold in the city's horchaterías with long, soft fartons pastries for dipping. It is made from chufas, or tiger nuts: small wrinkled tubers grown around the village of Alboraya just north of Valencia, which have their own protected designation of origin. Soaked, ground with water, strained and sweetened, they give a creamy, nutty, naturally dairy-free milk with a hint of cinnamon. Valencians drink it very cold, or half-frozen as 'granizada'. Chef's tip: soak the tiger nuts for a full 24 hours and change the water once; they must be plump and soft enough to blend into a fine pulp, or the horchata will be thin and taste of raw starch.