Tuesday, September 25, 2012

Biscotti on the Brain

My Mom brought over some super yummy biscotti the other day (which my daughter has demanded every morning since: "Scotti, Mommy!") so I decided to try my hand at it, although I am not much for baking. They were just too tasty and went too well with my morning coffee not to try to make a batch. So I found a bunch of recipes online and doctored up my own with what I had in my kitchen.

Almond Biscotti with Dates
1c. butter, softened
3c. whole wheat flour
1c. brown sugar
3 eggs
1t. vanilla
1T. baking powder
1/2t. salt
3/4c. chopped raw almonds
1/2c. chopped dates
First, cream your butter and sugar together in a mixer. Add your vanilla and eggs, one by one, into the running mixer. In another bowl, blend your flour, baking powder, and salt. Next time I'd like to use half all-purpose flour and half whole wheat flour just to get a little finer texture to the dough (though I didn't have any all-purpose so I used all w.w. and enjoyed them just the same).


Slowly add your dry ingredients to the mixer. Beat in your chopped almonds and dates.


Shape the dough into two logs and transfer to a greased baking sheet lined with tinfoil. I've recently made an oil spray out of grapeseed oil with a little water and it's been working very nicely.


Bake at 300 degrees until lightly browned, about 30 minutes. Remove to a wire rack and let cool 15 minutes. Transfer to a cutting board and slice each log into 1/2" slices using a serrated knife. Raise the oven temp to 325, arrange back onto cookie sheet, and bake another 15-20 minutes, flipping once halfway though baking. Transfer to wire rack to cool.


Store in a sealed container and enjoy in the morning with coffee or tea!