Description
Hazel is the name given to any member of the Corylus family. There are 18 different species, which are spread across much of the Northern Hemisphere.The nuts from all of these are edible, but we will be concerning ourselves here with just two – Corylus avellana (cobnut), the only true native British nut, and Corylus maxima (filbert) which was introduced to the UK from Northern Europe more than 2000 years ago. Although there is a slight difference in their shape, the terms cobnut and filbert are generally interchangeable, and both come under the catch-all name of ‘hazel’.
