Costco Fans Are Loving These Chocolate-Caramel Macadamia Nuts
If you can find them, Costco's Kirkland Signature Caramel Macadamia Clusters are apparently chocolate gems. "I LOVE Kirkland Signature macadamia milk chocolate salted caramel clusters!" Costco Buys gushed in a post featuring the product on Instagram. "These come and go so I always make sure to grab some when I see them!"
Fair enough. At Costco, you can get a 32-ounce jar of the nuts for $14.99. If that sounds like an unusually high price for Costco, you have to remember that these are macadamias, the most expensive nut in the world. Business Insider wrote in 2019 that a pound of macadamias could sell for $25. So two pounds for $15 is an exceedingly good deal.
And followers of Costco Buys seem to realize this. As of writing, 891 people have outed themselves as fiends for chocolate covered macadamias. "These are my absolute favorite!!" one very excited follower exclaimed. So, if you do find these gems, you should stock up in case the crowd picks the whole stack clean.
The problem with the macadamias
However, the problem with such a gem is that it can be hard to find. Most of the comments on the post say as much. "Unfortunately," Costco Secrets noted, "as of a month or so, these have been gone at my warehouse. I always buy a few." "Yes," another agreed, "super hard to find nowadays. Love these."
The scarcity could be due to Costco's aversion to offering really cheap macadamias. Another factor could be a supply issue that is, for once, actually separate from the eternal supply chain ruptures caused by the coronavirus pandemic.
Talking to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation in 2019, Market Development Manager Lynne Ziehlke explained that the price of the nut is due to its natural scarcity: "In terms of tree nuts globally, macadamias [only make up] 1 to 2 percent of global tree nut production." But macadamias have also been growing in popularity with things like macadamia milk and butter. Moreover, as Business Insider details, harvesting macadamias is also time-intensive because ripe and unripe nuts look so similar. So until the production of macadamias can meet with its popularity, finding Costco's product is definitely an event worth splurging on.