Making Biscotti

Biscotti is the plural form of biscotto. Bis- means twice, while -cotto means cooked or baked. These crispy cookies are baked twice to give them a super crispy texture and a dry state which allows them to be kept for weeks. This is one of the easiest cookies to make. The dough is made with creamed butter and sugar, eggs, flavoring and fillings (like nuts, raisins, etc), and then the dry ingredients (flour, salt, and baking powder). It's quite a sticky dough. So the only tricky part is forming them into two long and flat logs for the first baking -- well-floured hands are necessary to avoid sticking. After they are baked to fairly firm and starting to crack on top, they are cooled slightly and sliced. The sliced cookies are baked again on both sides to dry them out quickly. I followed the recipe from The Best Recipe that included almond extract, orange zest and toasted almonds. Yum!

Comments

Unknown said…
Wow these look exactly like the ones bought from the stores. Save me a couple if you still have any left :)

lol, I hardly have time to eat bread, and you're here making bread from scatch.
Albertitto said…
I baked these for my "Food Friday" at my work place -- we have a group of people on rotation to bring food on each Friday to share. So they were all gone now. But I can bake another batch if you like to try them. They are really easy to make. One of my co-workers took one cookie home to his wife, who used to be an Italian chef of some sort, and she approved! That made me very happy.

Don't worry about eating bread. You are busy bringing home the bread :-)
Catherine said…
I baked some biscotti one Xmas and hubby really likes it... didn't know I was suppose to turn them around and bake on the side. I'll try that next time~
Albertitto said…
yeah that'll dry them out :-)