Gosh, I want to thank all of you who have contributed recipes and ideas for using Nutella. I am looking forward to trying some of your recipes & suggestions but til then, I've been content with a little nip straight from the jar when I need a quick pick me up. I hope that those of you who try the Aldi brand are satisfied with the product. Also, I apologize for taking so long to get back to this thread and want you to know that I really appreciate each & every suggestion and, especially, the time you take out of your day to respond. (By way of explanation, we have been really busy back to work on our on again/ off again DIY kitchen remodel. Doing all the work ourselves including bldg. the cabinets, the old pay as you go shoestring budget approach to remodel.)

I put it in my son's lunch on top of his peanut butter--he loves it. It give him a little more calories and protein. I also have a recipe I got somewhere for Nutella brownies. You have to refrigerate for them to get hard but they are rich and delish! Nutella Cheesecake Brownies Ingredients for Brownie Layer: 10 tbsp butter (unsalted) melted and slightly cooled 1/4 c Nutella 2 large eggs 1 cup granulated sugar 1 cup all purpose flour 1/4 cup natural cocoa powder Ingredients for Cheesecake Layer: 8 oz cream cheese softened at room temp. 3 tbsp granulated sugar 2 large eggs 1/3 cup Nutella Preheat oven to 325F. Line a 9x9 inch pan with parchment. To make the brownie layer combine butter, Nutella, eggs and sugar in a large bowl and mix well. Sift in flour and cocoa powder and mix until well combined. Pour batter into prepared pan and spread evenly. Set aside while you prepare the cheesecake layer. To make the cheesecake layer, mix the cream cheese, sugar, eggs and Nutella until well combined. Pour over your brownie batter. Bake at 325F until the cheesecake looks set, about 40-45 minutes. Allow brownies to cool completely in the pan before cutting. I cut my brownies into 36 pieces since they are quite decadent.) Enjoy!

Actually a pound cake type recipe works best for anything that's in a more intricate mold. There are good chocolate pound cakes too. I'll look around for recipes I have later if you don't get anything that you want. As far as the icing goes, sure a basic cream cheese icing can work, but it needs to stay pretty stiff. The main thing to remember when wanting to decorate with icing is to keep it fairly stiff so it's easy to work with. Just keep checking when you add the liquid to see the consistency. The recipe below is from Cooks Country and went with a red velvet cake... which might work actually. It has so much cream cheese that it doesn't use milk. I make it with about half the cream cheese and then add milk to get the consistency I want. Frosting 16 tablespoons unsalted butter , softened 4 cups confectioners' sugar 16 ounces cream cheese , cut into 8 pieces, softened 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract Pinch salt With electric mixer, beat butter and sugar on medium-high speed until fluffy, about 2 minutes. Add cream cheese, one piece at a time, and beat until incorporated, about 30 seconds. Beat in vanilla and salt. Refrigerate until ready to use. My basic butter cream is a stick of butter per pound of confectioners sugar, flavoring, pinch of salt and then enough milk to get whatever stiffness I need for the application.

Success! Ok, now this doesn't look that great but I wasn't really being too careful. I just wanted to get a general idea of how it would look, how much work it would be and how much time it would take. Firstly, my meatloaf recipe is going to have to go easy on any fat. I used two lb of ground beef (90/10) and less than half a pound of sausage but I think that sausage was full of fat because boy was there a lot of shrinkage and fat. That didn't help the look of the cake as they were no longer really round like a cake. So I'm going to get much leaner beef and leave out the sausage next time. I decided to go ahead with the mashed potatoes method after seeing Martha Stewart's demo. It helped me to see it actually being done. And I went with instant mashed potatoes. Not the most delicious, I know, but smooth and easy to work with and quick. I went ahead and put it together and stuck it in the fridge, then reheated it in the MW for about 12 minutes. It heated up just fine temperature-wise but the side decorations kinda melted. I'm thinking that I'm going to just bake the suckers about 2 hours before the party, let them sit for about 20 minutes, then go ahead and do the frosting with the potatoes. I will then just put it on a warming tray and cover it up till party time. Not ideal as I really don't want to be busy at that time, but it only took me about 15 minutes to do the entire cake. Oh, and I didn't add the cherry tomatoes, or peas/carrots as Martha did, but I probably will for the party. Just didn't feel like messing with it today. The meatloaf/potato combo tasted pretty good in the end. The fact that it was instant mashed potatoes wasn't as bad as I thought it might be -- it worked quite well with the meat. Thanks so much everyone for your input. It was invaluable!!