Healthy Chocolate Hazelnut Pudding

This Healthy Chocolate Hazelnut Pudding is easy to make and you don’t even need to cook! It has an avocado base and comes together quickly in the food processor. There’s hazelnut oil and toasted hazelnuts to really bring out that Nutella like flavor when combined with the chocolate. It’s gluten free, dairy free, paleo, egg free, and vegan which makes it one of my favorite decadent desserts that almost everyone can eat!

We’ve been making this pudding for years, and it never ceases to please whenever I make it for company. It’s easy to throw together in the food processor, and it can be made ahead as well for the ultimate convenience.

I’ve even made it meal prep style and portioned it out in the small 1/4 cup sized mason jars for Tyler’s lunches. His pudding ‘snack packs’ are all the envy at lunchtime where he works.

And perhaps the biggest bonus of this pudding is it’s actually a healthy dessert. The base of this pudding is made from avocados, but I promise you can’t taste the avocado at all. Chocolate is a strong flavor, and when paired with hazelnuts, there’s no way avocado is going to get through all of that.

I’ve had lots of questions over the years about my avocado based desserts about whether or not you can taste it. But I can absolutely assure you, that in the 5 years I’ve been making desserts with avocado, not even a single person has ever known there was avocado in their dessert.

And I should say too that I’ve tested these desserts out on avocado haters, and they’ve never guessed what the secret ingredient is. So hopefully if you have some doubts about avocado in a dessert, that should help you out!

Let’s get started making this Healthy Chocolate Hazelnut Pudding step by step!

First of all, everything for this pudding gets tossed into a food processor.

Tip: If you have any skeptics in your house, be sure not to let them see the avocados going into the food processor. They will never know when they eat this pudding!

Then you process the pudding until all the green bits of avocado are gone, and a silky smooth pudding appears. It helps to scrape down the sides a couple of times to make sure the cocoa powder gets fully mixed in.

Then it’s on to the toppings! I toast my hazelnuts in the oven at 250ºF for 20-30 minutes. Or roast them until they’re golden brown and smell very fragrant. After they’ve cooled, you want to rub what you can of the skins off because they’re bitter. Then roughly chop them, and set them aside.

For the whipped cream you can make 2 different textures depending on your preference. I wrote a whole post about Homemade Coconut Whipped Cream 2 Different Ways for more details.

I prefer a looser whipped cream if I’m keeping it for a couple of days. The whipped cream tends to firm up as it sits. But if I’m serving it right away, I like to make the firmer version of coconut whipped cream. You find that version listed in the recipe below.

The pudding can be made ahead and kept for a couple of days in the fridge. The nuts can also be toasted and chopped ahead, and kept in an airtight container. I personally like to make the coconut whipped cream right before serving to make sure it’s fluffy and fresh. But you can also make it a couple hours ahead to make serving time easier!

I really hope you enjoy this Healthy Chocolate Hazelnut Pudding! And if you do get a chance to make this, I hope you’ll leave me a comment/rating below. I always love hearing from you here! Also for more healthy chocolate desserts, head on over to the recipe index.

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