“Don’t mind me, I’ll just be over here making everything magical and shit.”http://www.Tinybeans.com
Memes like this one are popular in the month of December. While sarcastically comical, I’m going to suggest that they hold a great deal of truth. They usually imply that Mom is the production manager for the holiday, but I’d argue that it’s dads, too. On the farm, Daddy was annually elected to head out and find a tree, then schlep it home using clips and ropes to “magically” hold it on the top of the car. And while Mom was the tree-side director, it was still his job to climb up the tree and evenly disperse and attach the Christmas lights prior to all of us hanging bulbs, Ivory Soap “snow,” and tinsel. No small feat, that.
Mom was the indisputable producer of Christmas kitchen magic, though. While this encompassed a wide range of rich and delicious dishes, today I’m looking at you, Christmas cookies. And some of these masterpieces weren’t even for consumption. We spent a raucous evening each year decorating cutout sugar cookies to be hung on a small tabletop Christmas tree. The competition for best cookie decorator of the year was intense. When it came to the cookies that would be eaten, there might have been one or two standards, but Mom was always up for trying the year’s new holiday trends in cookie baking. As I peruse her/my recipe file, I see classics like butterscotch shortbread, buttery thumbprints, molasses butterballs, Mexican wedding cakes, etc. etc. There is a theme here and it’s all about the butter… which my mom most decidedly loved.
Given that I’m trying to improve my blood test results, my use of butter in this past year has plummeted by about 75%. So at least some of the cookie joy this year had to come from a butterless cookie. Cue the olive oil… again…
I’ve raved about the virtues of the Italian cookie before, so I’ll spare you. But the history! Something else entirely. Biscotti are the great great grandmother of all Italian cookies. The word means literally “twice baked.” Because they bake twice, they become dry and crisp, allowing them to be stored for periods of time. The idea dates back to the Roman legions, which carried a twice-baked bread, probably similar to today’s rusk, on their various conquests. The sweetened biscuit I’m sharing today, however, is much more like the almond biscuits originating in the Tuscan city of Prato. But we are still talking 14th century. These crunchy little biscuits have been around for a while! Biscotti are sometimes baked using butter, sometimes with oil, and other times with no fat other than that included in the yolk of multiple eggs. But of course, I’m baking them with olive oil.
This recipe makes a boatload of biscotti, which is fine by me, as they freeze beautifully and last a while. Prepared with all wheat flour they are more cookie like, made with part almond flour they are Italian to the core. The latter version produces crusty crunchy biscotti filled with little nooks and crannies. Some of those little spaces are filled with the fruit, nuts and chocolate. Pastry chefs might like to dip or coat their biscotti in melted chocolate, but let me think… do I need an additional task after I’ve baked these babies twice? No… I am just folding slivers of chocolate right into the dough. Once baked, these are my cookies of choice to dip into my daily post lunch cappuccino. Yes, I know; you can tell that retirement here is tough work. (Not.)
Given that it’s time for the New Year, you’ve most probably already overdosed on Christmas cookies; you may be preparing resolutions to rid yourself of this year’s accumulation, actually. So clip/save this recipe for a time that you’d like to sit back and put your feet up with coffee and a cookie. That time will come ‘round before you know it.
Cranberry Walnut Chocolate Biscotti
Ingredients
- 1/3 cup dried cranberries
- 2 tbsp Grand Marnier or other orange liqueur
- 1/3 cup olive oil
- 1/2 tsp fiori di sicilia may substitute vanilla + 1 tsp orange zest
- 2 large eggs
- 1 3/4 cup whole wheat pastry flour or 1 1/4 cups flour + 1/2 cup almond meal
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 cup finely chopped walnuts
- 1 oz dark chocolate, finely shaved
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350° F. Line a standard cookie sheet with parchment paper.
- Macerate the cranberries in the Grand Marnier while preparing the dough.
- Pour the olive oil into the work bowl of a stand mixer. With the mixer running medium low, gradually add the sugar and beat til well mixed. Add the extract, then the eggs, one at a time. Beat til well mixed and fluffy.
- Combine the flour, salt and baking powder. With mixer at low speed, add gradually to the creamed mixture until soft dough forms. Mix in the cranberries, walnuts and slivers of shaved chocolate thoroughly.
- Using half the dough, shape into 2 logs on the cookie sheet, each approximately 2 ½ inches wide, and 10 inches long. Bake the biscotti for 20-25 minutes, til the logs are firm and beginning to brown. Remove from the oven and allow to cool for several minutes. Use a spatula to maneuver the logs, one at a time onto a cutting board. Slice the logs on the diagonal, making slices about 3/8 inch wide. Return the individual slices to the baking sheet as you cut them. When both logs are sliced and on the cookie sheet, return the sheet to the oven for about 10 minutes. Remove them from the oven and transfer to a cooling rack.
Notes
Loved this