El Mordjene: The banned Algerian spread threatening to upset Nutella
How the rise of a chocolate-and-hazelnut concoction has stirred up some controversy – and competition.
In 2024, Nutella celebrated its 60th year as one of Italy’s most successful exports. But an Algerian upstart has been stealing the thunder of Ferrero Group’s famous chocolate spread. For sweet-toothed aficionados in France, Belgium and the Arab world, 2024 was the year of El Mordjene, a chocolate-and-hazelnut cream made by Algerian confectioner Cebon. This family business, founded in 1997, created El Mordjene in 2021 using hazelnuts, milk, cocoa, palm oil and, of course, lots of sugar.
Earlier this year, El Mordjene became a viral hit among Francophone internet users, which led to an explosion in popularity. As Cebon shifted gears to meet demand, there was a setback: French customs officials began detaining pallets of El Mordjene. Though it had been available in France since 2023, the spike in imports led authorities to realise that it had been on sale illegally, as EU rules forbid the import of Algerian products containing dairy. In Algeria, the press cried foul, with some inaccurately claiming that El Mordjene had been banned because it threatened to take Nutella’s crown.
Despite the ban, El Mordjene’s success provided an image boost for Algeria in the face of recent diplomatic setbacks with its former colonial masters. (In July, for instance, France sided with neighbouring Morocco in a decades-long dispute over the Western Sahara.) Indeed, the import ban might just be fuelling the hype, as French confiseurs and recipe websites compete to create a replica.
