Nocino, Black Walnut Liquor

Rating

4.89 stars (68 reviews)

Keywords

Black Walnuts, Nocino

Ingredients

• 3 lbs unripe, green black walnuts (soft enough that they can be easily cut with a knife )
• 1.75 litre (7.4 cups) vodka (or substitute everclear, see note )
• 10 whole cloves and/or allspice berries (You could omit these and add 2 T good coffee beans instead. )
• Small handful of Galium triflorum leaves or sweet woodruff (Optional, highly recommended )
• 1/2 cup chopped angelica stem or root (Optional)
• 3 cups Maple Syrup or sugar (or to taste, see note )
• 3 cups Water

Categories

• Snack

Cuisine

• Italian

Reviews

• Robert on 2026-06-25 (5 stars):
  I'll be harvesting my first batch of walnuts for nocino tonight, and I came across an Italian recipe that initially uses a large amount of sugar to extract the flavors, very similar to your walnut molasses recipe. The website is Eatalianwithroberto (I won't include the link, in case that sets off your spam detector) but you can find it easily enough with Google (search for "Easy steps to your homemade Italian walnut liqueur (nocino)" and his website's name.) More importantly, at the end of his nocino recipe he links to another recipe where he uses the spent walnuts from nocino to make his nociato (walnut wine), except he says in Italy they use a dry white wine (peccorino or frascati is mentioned) instead of the red wine that's used in France. I figure you'd be interested in getting every last drop of goodness out of the walnuts. I'm hoping to harvest enough walnuts to try both of your recipes (nocino and molasses) as well as Roberto's. I shall report back next year with the results.
• Leftcoaster on 2025-12-01 (5 stars):
  Thanks for the idea to use tree based sweeteners for the nocino, I tried maple syrup in my last batch and it made it even tastier and more herbal/tree flavoured. I didn't add any spices, I like it to be just green walnuts and a few young leaf tips plus grain alcohol and I tend to like it a lot less sweet than they do in Italia. You can make nociato from the spent walnuts after you strain the nocino. One or two bottles of dry white wine poured over to cover the nuts and left for a couple of weeks and then strained will give you a very delicious and lighter aperitivi or digestivo. Kind of a cousin to vin de noix, you can use it as vermouth in mixed drinks as well.