Nothing like having a hot and creamy cup of coffee and dipping a homemade biscotti in it! I have tried and experimented with lots of variations, but I like my original Macademia nut recipe best. I’ve tweaked the recipe here and there and often add a few extra things from time to time… like a little potato flour… but it is all good.
the right business cards make all the difference
This week Laura and I took a little time to enjoy Los Angeles at ‘El Cholo’s’ and also managed to help our daughters with a few of their travel plans. We were able to run their visa paperwork for them. This year they will be going to the Reputation Institute’s Convention in Rio de Janeiro. The folks at the Brazilian Consulatewere very efficient and the women working there were – let’s just say– attractive. I asked my daughters to bring me a t-shirt! 😉 With so many people ‘hunkering down’ in this tough economy, it is refreshing to see young people trying to make more of their life and build for their future. This is a lesson we all can learn.
Someone asked what I was doing lately… having a little fun on life’s journey. I hope you do too.
When my children were young, I would have been very happy to have had a cookie jar like this one! Although it sounds large ( 5 or 6 quarts) which it would be if it happened to be a cooking pot, as a cookie jar it is just right! Actually, I bought it to hold some store bought biscotti… but more importantly my home made Biscotti! (the picture above is linked to where I bought the jar)
Laura is very attached to a classic chicken cookie jar that is very… cute… but totally inadequate to house even one day’s supply of baking for all the cookie monsters in our house. We really needed something like this… and even though we found it late… it is getting well used! I could even imagine a counter lined with these jars each containing a different cookie or snack…. but , unfortunately, no room for that luxury.
One of the greatest go-alongs with the best coffee is ‘Biscotti.’ Biscotti is a dry flavored cookie that was made to be dipped into coffee unleashing all of the previously hidden flavors! The challenge is finding a worthy recipe. The problem is that most of the Biscotti Recipes were fairly bland and not comparable with good commercial products. I decided to look into why there is difference.
First of all, the best commercial recipes include: butter, baking soda and baking powder. I suspect a little extra cornstarch is also added ( as you know cornstarch is already an ingredient in baking powder). In most of ‘home’ biscotti recipes, the batter is far too sticky to be manageable even on greased wax paper and this calls for a bit more flour and sugar for control. Lastly, diced macadamia nuts, nut flavorings ( I choose almond) and a good helping of vanilla makes it perfect!
So, at only 115 calories… this Biscotti works for my diet! Now, if you choose to dip it into white chocolate… that adds a little. Here’s the nutritional data:
Basic ingredients:
3 cups bread flour
1/2 cup potato flour
2 cups powdered sugar
3 eggs
1/3 cup butter
1/2 cups macadamia nuts whole and pieces ( then chop)
1/2 teaspoons baking soda
3 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon cornstarch
1/2 teaspoon almond extract*
1 tablespoon vanilla extract*
* or replace with 2 scraped Vanilla Beans
1/8 teaspoon nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
Process
1) use two bowls:
Bowl A — all dry ingredients and diced nuts
Bowl B — all wet ingredients, including parified butter plus powdered sugar
2) Add the dry ingredients to the liquid slowly and stir with a wooden spoon.
3) Place 1/2 the batter on buttered wax paper and spread out to 12 inches in length and about 1/2 inch thick and do the same with the other 1/2
4) place in preheated over 350 degrees for about 30 minutes then allow to cool
5) slice 3/4 to one inch sections… each section should provide 13 -14 pieces for a total of around 27
6) rebake for 7 -9 minutes with one cut side face down
7) flip the biscotti and toast the opposite side for another 7-9 minutes
8) OPTIONAL: dip the flat side of the biscotti into melted white chocolate an place down on wax paper to cool.
sound yummy enough?
NOTE: a fun change in spices is to use 1/4 teaspoon of my egg nog spice mix
Anyone who loves coffee knows that it is very important to find something delicious to dip into it! I have to confess to a life-long love of Biscotti… and, unfortunately, Biscotti loves me a bit too much! In the past, I viewed boxes of Biscotti as single servings — but at 100 calories a piece — it was not great for my waistline . However, being careful, one biscotti makes for a great addition to coffee a couple of times a day ( 10am and 3pm for me) and helps keep my diet on track!
However, if you are looking for a great recipe on-line be a bit careful. Some of the recipes are good but I think they try too hard to be low-fat, low sugar, and end up low taste. What is impressive is the variety of biscotti flavors … and they are mind boggling: almond, chocolate, hazelnut, ginger bread, pumpkin, cranberry and pistachio ( I think not!), Peanut butter, Oats and more combinations than you can imagine.
My goal is a simple one: to see how muchPeters Chocolate I can use and keep the recipe colorically reasonable , yet delicious, for me.
Stay Tuned.
Roger
Coffaro’s makes a great qualitycommercial product.
I have found that few things transform you in time quite like an old cookbook. We get wonderful hints as to what it was like to live and dine in another era. Recently, I came across a fascinating little book that you can still find a few recent reprints if you look around. “The Virginia Housewife or, Methodical Cook” was first published in 1831. The author wrote her book:
‘from the want of books sufficiently clear and concise… to reduce every thing in the culinary line, to proper weights and measures… for, when the ingredients employed were given in just proportions, the article made was equally good.”
This was in an era when the culinary skills were truly a ‘learn by doing’ activity and normally little was ever written down and everything committed to memory. It appears that this cookbook was a widely reprinted reference well into the civil war.
We all wonder what recipes might be popular enough with ingredients commonplace enough to be placed in a cookbook of that time? Many of the recipes are very basic: on how to clean and dress various animals, sauces, puddings and desserts, preserves, pickling and the making of beer and cordials. But what it does include that might surprise you is a nice recipe for ‘Curried Chicken’. As you know curry powder is a blend of spices and she even includes a recipe for her ‘curry.’ Who knew?
TO MAKE A DISH OF CURRY AFTER THE EAST INDIAN MANNER
Cut two chickens as for fricassee, wash them clean, and put them in a stew pan with as much water as will cover them; sprinkle them with a large spoonful of salt, and let them boil until tender, cover close all the time, and skim them well; when boiled enough,take up the chickens, and put the liquor of them into a pan, then put half a pound of fresh butter in the pan, and brown it a little; put into it two cloves of garlic, and a large onion sliced, and let these all fry till brown, often shaking the pan; then put in the chickens, and sprinkle over them two or thee spoonfuls of curry powder; then cover the pan close, and let the chickens do till brown, often shaking the pan; then put in the liquor the chickens were boiled in, and all stew together until tender; if acid is agreeable squeeze the juice of a lemon or orange in it.
CURRY POWDER
One ounce turmeric, one do. coriander seed, one do. cumin seed, one do. white ginger, one cayenne pepper; pound all together, and pass them through a fine sieve; bottle and cork it well — one tea-spoon is sufficient to season any made dish.
