All nuts are pretty good plain, roasted and salted, but if you want to add more seasonings to them, it becomes a bit problematic. You don’t get good adherence; seasoning ingredients tend to fall or drip off the nuts onto the roasting sheet and burn. That’s not too much of a problem in some cases, for instance in Nigella Lawson’s recipe for roasted nuts:
Union Square Bar Nuts
- 500g assorted unsalted nuts, including: peeled peanuts, cashews, Brazil nuts, hazelnuts, walnuts, pecans and whole unpeeled almonds
- 2 tablespoons coarsely chopped fresh rosemary (from 2 8cm sprigs)
- half tsp cayenne pepper
- 2 teasps dark muscavado sugar
- 2 teasps Malden salt
- 1 tablespoon unsalted butter, melted
1.Preheat the oven to 180C/ gas mark 4.
2.Toss the nuts in a large bowl to combine and spread them out on a baking sheet. Toast in the oven till they become light golden brown, about 10 minutes.
3.In a large bowl, combine the rosemary, cayenne, muscavado sugar, salt and melted butter.
4.Thoroughly toss the toasted nuts with the spiced butter and serve warm. And once you eat these, you will never want to stop.
This is a great recipe, and a great method for sticking the ingredients to the nuts, but it can be a bit greasy. Also, for all its goodness, this recipe only provides a light seasoning.
If you want to go bigger and bolder, you need a glue, and that glue is beaten egg white. If you use just enough egg white to hold the seasoning ingredients together, it will fuse them in a crisp coating to the surface of the nuts. Too much egg white, and the seasonings will drip off the nuts, and just burn on the pan.
An excellent example of this method is the recipe for Savory Roasted Almonds at Sprouted Kitchen. This recipe uses fresh thyme and parmesan, and makes the kitchen smell wonderful.
Savory Roasted Almonds
The spice measurements here are pretty moderate, if you like it spicier or love lemon for example, adjust as you desire. I know the sugar seems a bit out of place here, but it helps with the crust. Also, because ovens are all a bit different, test them after the recommended time. Note that they will dry out and crisp up even more once they cool out of the oven.
- 3 Cups/16 oz. Raw Almonds
- 2 Small Egg Whites (OR 1 Extra Large Egg White)
- 1/3 Cup Fresh Thyme Leaves
- 1 Tbsp. Red Pepper Flakes
- 1 Tbsp. Dried Oregano
- 1 Tbsp. Garlic Powder
- 3 Tbsp. Lemon Zest
- 2 tsp. Black Pepper
- 1 1/2 Tbsp. Natural Cane Sugar/Sucanat
- Sea Salt
- 1/2 Cup Finely Grated Parmesan Cheese
Oven to 275′
1. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper or foil. In a bowl, or pestle and mortar, add the thyme, red pepper, oregano, garlic powder, black pepper, lemon zest and sugar together. If you have a pestle and mortar, grind all of the spices together to break them up a bit. You won’t get much of a paste, but the thyme should break down a bit and the red peppers will get smaller. Otherwise, the back of a heavy spoon will suffice as well.
2. Whisk the egg whites until frothy (about 2 minutes). Add the almonds, and fold them over to coat. Add the spices mixture and mix again until they seem evenly distributed.
3. Spread the nuts out on the baking sheet and give them all a very generous grind of sea salt. Sprinkle half of the parmesan evenly, and toss to coat. Make sure the nuts are spread in a single layer, and sprinkle the remaining cheese on top of the nuts. At this point, I added a fresh grind of black pepper all over, but that is your choice.
4. Bake in the middle rack for 25 minutes. Remove to cool completely before serving. And a final little dusting of parmesan when they are hot out of the oven never hurt anyone either.
Note that you’re using a low temperature here, 275°F. The longer cooking time helps dry out the egg white. Also, as noted above, nuts roasted this way need to cool completely to become crisp. When warm out of the oven, they are a bit chewy.
Recipes such as the above two should work well with most kinds of nut, or a mix of nuts. Obviously pine nuts are much smaller, and would need to be watched very carefully.
If using walnuts, it’s best to soak them for several hours or overnight. This will leach away a lot of their bitterness. Start in a batch of very warm water, then let it cool gradually. Before using in a recipe, drain, pat dry, then dry at low temperature in a 200ºF oven with the oven door cracked open.