Dark Chocolate Cherry Biscotti . . .

After the spicy, nutty, creamy, buttery, pumpkin-laden extravaganza that comprises the universe of Thanksgiving Day desserts I now find that I'm in the mood for something distinctly crunchy, slightly bittersweet, entirely absent of butter, and far from gooey.

These dark-chocolate cherry biscotti evoke all the best attributes of chocolate-covered cherries, absent the rich fat and cloying sweetness of that iconic candy. They're supremely dunkable if you're a coffee drinker, and they don't mind taking a dip in a glass of milk if you're not.

Surely I don't have to tell you that I briefly considered drizzling the biscotti with melted chocolate, (you know me) but the sense of restraint that invades a baker's psyche the week following Thanksgiving held sway. And it's a good thing it did. I figure, when you take the plunge and coat your biscotti with chocolate, you're committing to the creation of an altogether more indulgent cookie.

Today's treat provides a nice contrast to the extreme richness of last week's feast. Thanksgiving comes but once a year, and we all love it, but once is enough. Thank heaven for that.

About this recipe . . . 

Adapted from pastry chef David Lebovitz's beautiful book, Ready for Dessert, I made a few minor adjustments to his biscotti formula.

I omitted the black pepper (yes, pepper), reduced the amount of solid chocolate by about half, omitted almond extract in favor of vanilla, and soaked my dried cherries in the lusciousness of Chambord, a yummy berry liqueur, versus his suggestion of kirsch/grappa/rum.

Really good biscotti, fellow bakers. I baked the pieces long enough so they'd be very hard and crunchy. Expect lots and lots of lovely little crumbs. And don't forget to dunk.

Dark Chocolate Cherry Biscotti

(For a printable version of this recipe, click here!)

Yield: Two loaves of biscotti, each loaf sliced into about 14 half-inch thick pieces

Spread parchment over two regular size baking sheets, or over one large sheet.
Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.
(No electric mixer needed for this recipe.)

Ingredients: 
2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
3/4 cup Dutch-process cocoa powder (You don't have to use Dutch, but I think it's the best for something like this; I used Penzeys brand.)
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon (I used fine sea salt.)
3 large eggs, at room temperature
1 cup granulated sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/3 cup dark chocolate, chopped small (I used Guittard disks, 60+ percent cacao.) 
3/4 cup dried cherries, cut in half if they're large
2 tablespoons Chambord (or any similar fruity liqueur that you really like)

To brush/sprinkle on the dough before baking:
1 egg, beaten
2 tablespoons sanding/coarse white sugar, or turbinado or Demarara sugar

In a small bowl, drizzle the Chambord over the cherries and let them sit for at least 30 minutes or so at room temperature.

In a medium bowl, sift together the flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt.

In a large bowl, completely whisk together the three large eggs, the granulated sugar, and the vanilla extract.

Into that, gradually add the sifted ingredients. The dough will be very dry and thick. Dump the dried cherries, with all of their liquid, into the bowl. Stir that in. Add in the chocolate pieces and stir to combine as best you can. The dough will be extremely thick and pretty sticky.

Plop all of the dough onto a lightly floured work surface and divide it in half. Lightly flour your hands.

Roll each dough-half into a long log, a few inches shorter than the length of your baking sheet(s);  the dough spreads out quite a bit in all directions when baking. Place each log onto a parchment-covered baking sheet. Dampen your palms with cold water and pat the top of the loaves, gently pressing down so each log is slightly flattened.

Using a pastry brush, liberally coat each loaf with beaten egg; do this twice to each log. Sprinkle sanding/coarse sugar (or whatever kind you've chosen to use) atop the length of each loaf.

Bake the loaves for 25 minutes in a 350 degree oven, reversing the pan(s) in the oven halfway through the baking time. Remove them from the oven; lower the oven temperature to 300 degrees. Leaving the loaves on the baking sheets, let them cool for up to 15 minutes.

Move the loaves, still on their parchment, to a cutting surface. Using a serrated knife (ideally, a very sharp bread knife), cut each loaf on the diagonal into slices that are about 1/2" thick (I think mine were actually a little thicker than that).

Lay all of the biscotti pieces, cut sides down, back onto parchment-covered baking sheets.

Continue to bake for 20 to 30 minutes, flipping the pieces over halfway through, and reversing the direction of the baking sheet(s) in the oven. If you want the cookies to be really hard and crunchy, bake them for the maximum amount of time, and check to see that they're pretty firm before you take them out of the oven.

When they're done, let them cool completely on the baking sheets. Store them well covered. They'll be good for about a week. (And, of course, if you're dying to dip them in melted chocolate, well, follow your dream!)

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Bittersweet Chocolate & Pistachio Biscotti . . .

Mother's Day, a couple of weeks back, was very, very good to me. From my husband and boys I received a fantastic new cake turntable. It's the one I've coveted for months, the best one I've ever seen--and I've seen quite a few over the last couple of years. Really heavy, with a nondetachable cast-iron base and a rubber-lined bottom, it's as sturdy as all get out. This baby spins more smoothly than a roulette wheel in Vegas. I love it. My 13-year old son, Nathan, and I set it spinning one night and it twirled nonstop for over three minutes. That must be some kind of record. We were in awe. 

I took it for a test drive last weekend. Used it to frost a coconut cake with seven minute frosting. The turntable was a hit. The cake layers were not too shabby. But the glossy, snowy-white frosting? That stuff was drippier than white-hot asphalt and twice as sticky. I didn't bother photographing that baby. I'm gonna give coconut cake another try sometime soon, next time with a completely different coating. Stay tuned.

Anyway, I also received a copy of The Sono Baking Company Cookbook, by John Barricelli. It's a brand  new book and I'm pleased to report it has enormous appeal. There's nothing worse than eagerly anticipating the publication of a long-awaited cookbook and, upon receiving it, being let down. Want to know my informal barometer of how much I like a cookbook? I use torn pieces of sticky notes as bookmarks to help me keep track of recipes I want to try; with this book, I expect to have so many pieces of paper sticking up out of the top it's gonna look like it's growing a thick head of hair.

This biscotti recipe, which I apparently adapted in less than stellar fashion, is the first biscotti I've made in many months. The end result was not what I expected, but it was interesting enough. I'm used to biscotti that's very dry, very crunchy, and structurally solid. There was an unexpected denseness to the texture of this biscotti, and though not actually moist, it was certainly not dry in the way I thought it should be. It had a slight crumbly aspect, too, that seemed odd. Perhaps I underbaked them?

Of course, I veered from the original recipe in my use of pistachios, versus the recommended hazelnuts. I think I probably sliced the loaves too thickly. I wanted the individual slices to be long and not stubby, so I ignored the author's advice to make them into two 17" long logs. I made mine into two 12" long oval loafs. Were I to repeat this recipe, I'd use almost-finely chopped nuts. I also think I'd use a sweeter chocolate. The bitterness of very dark chocolate in combination with the highly distinctive taste of pistachios didn't seamlessly mesh.

So, it's not bad biscotti, all in all, but nothing to write home about as I prepared it. Had I stuck to the letter of the recipe, I might be singing a dramatically different tune right now. But that's okay. Live and learn!

Bittersweet Chocolate & Pistachio Biscotti 

(For a printable version of this recipe, click here!)

1 cup nuts (as noted above, the original recipe calls for hazelnuts and I used unsalted pistachios; next time I might try almonds. You should use what you prefer!)

2 and 2/3 cups All-Purpose flour (I used unbleached) 

1/2 cup Dutch processed cocoa powder

1 Tbsp. baking powder

1/2 cup unsalted butter, at room temperature

3/4 cup granulated sugar

1 tsp. coarse salt (I used kosher)

3 large eggs, at room temperature

2 oz. bittersweet chocolate, very finely chopped

1 large egg white, lightly beaten, for the egg wash

coarse/sanding sugar for sprinkling

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line a large baking with parchment paper. 

Chop the nuts into very small pieces.

Whisk together the flour, cocoa powder, and baking powder in a bowl. Set aside.

In a mixer bowl, using the paddle attachment, beat the butter, granulated sugar, and salt on medium-high speed until light and fluffy, for about 2 to 3 minutes. Scrape the bowl and beaters as needed. Blend in the eggs one at a time. 

On low speed, pour in the dry ingredients and mix until the flour has been absorbed. 

Remove the bowl from the mixer. The dough will be quite thick. Using a spoon or spatula, fold/stir in the chopped chocolate and the nuts. (My dough was extremely stiff and hard to stir/fold.)

  

 

Form the dough into a ball and divide it in half. On a work surface dusted with flour, and with flour dusted hands, shape each half into a log (17" long) or a loaf shape (about 12" long). Transfer each log/loaf to the baking sheet. The log/loaf should be rather flat, no more than an about inch high.

Brush each loaf with the beaten egg white, and sprinkle each one with sanding/coarse sugar. 

 

Bake the loaves for about 20 minutes on the middle rack, until they spring back slightly when pressed at the thickest spot. (After 10 minutes of baking, reverse the direction of the baking sheet in the oven for even baking.) Leaving the oven on, remove the loaves from the oven and let them cool on the baking sheet, set on top of a cooling rack, for about 10 minutes.

Move the loaves carefully onto a cutting surface. Using a serrated knife or a very sharp chef's knife (I used the latter; the former didn't work for me at all), cut the loaves on the diagonal into slices about 3/4" thick. 

Put all of the slices on the baking sheet, cut side down.  Place in the oven to bake for another 12 minutes or so, until the biscotti are completely dried and crisp (thus do as I say, not as I did!). 

Cool the slices on the pan for a about 10 minutes, then let them cool completely on a rack. Store the cooled biscotti in a covered container for up to about 1 week. 

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Bakin' After Midnight . . . Cinnamon Biscotti with White Chocolate Chips . . .

Last night I found myself in a rare situation. No one around here at home but me--all night long. It's nice to have such a night now and again. You can do just about whatever you want, within reason of course, without cramping anyone's style. You can watch movies that hold no appeal whatsoever for your family members. Sometime past midnight I started watching "Elegy," with Ben Kingsley and Penelope Cruz, a sensuous love story (yeah, no kids in the room when this baby's on and don't forget to take the DVD out of the player when the film's over) that moves at the luscious pace of lukewarm caramel, and rewards the viewer with a slightly ambiguous ending. I liked it a lot, but then I enjoy caramel at any temperature.

Also, if you want to, you can eat nothing but microwave popcorn for dinner and wash it down with a self-destructive amount of diet pop (did that too . . . I'm no saint in the diet pop department lately. . . I really need to kick the habit). You can always surf baking blogs until you're blue in the face and start to get a headache. Did that. You can bang things around in the kitchen while you bake into the wee hours of the night. Did that too . . . no surprise there.

What was the fruit of my midnight labor? Cinnamon biscotti. Specifically, cinnamon biscotti with white chocolate chips, though you might not be able to tell from the photos. The chips sort of turned the color of butterscotch when the biscotti were on their final stint in the oven. The white chocolate chips still taste good . . . I guess one might say they just changed their complexion.

I like biscotti because it's one of few foods that hold up fairly well when dipped in a cup of coffee. Coffee and biscotti were made for each other. In terms of toothsomeness (that is a real word, you know) and texture, it's kind of the human equivalent of a milk-bone dog biscuit. Have you ever seen a puppy gnawing happily on one of those? They turn their head this way and that. They concentrate and give it all they've got. It's a real project for the pooch. That's how I feel about biscotti. Just give me a piece of biscotti now and then, along with a hot cup of coffee, and I'll follow you anywhere.

I got this recipe from an obscure website a while ago and jotted it down without copying the name of the site (dumb of me! . . . the words "always cite your source" might as well be tattooed on my arm from all the years I spent working for a publisher). Anyway, I think it's a decent recipe that would be easy to alter and customize in the future. The only changes I made to it last night were to use the seeds of half a vanilla bean instead of any vanilla extract, and to add in about half a cup of Ghirardelli white chocolate chips. Also, if I'd baked the biscotti as long as the original recipe indicated, it would have been burned to a crisp. Mine came out medium-well as it was so, accordingly, I've adjusted the baking times downward in the version below.


Cinnamon Biscotti

(For a printable version of this recipe, click here!)

2 cups of All Purpose flour, bleached
2 tsp. of ground cinnamon (I used Penzey's Vietnamese Cassia--yeah, I know, I always say that)
1 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt
1 cup granulated sugar
6 Tbsp. unsalted butter, softened
2 large eggs
1 large egg yolk
Seeds of half of one vanilla bean
1 egg white, lightly beaten
1/2 cup white chocolate chips, if you like (or could use chopped nuts instead if you prefer)

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Line two cookie sheets with parchment paper.

In a medium bowl, combine flour, cinnamon, baking powder, and salt. Set aside.

In bowl of mixer, with paddle attachment, beat the sugar and butter until light colored and thoroughly combined.

Add the 2 eggs, and the 1 egg yolk; beat well.

Add in the vanilla seeds. Mix well, until you see the vanilla dispersed throughout the dough.

Gradually, with the mixer on medium low, spoon in the dry ingredients. Mix until well combined. Add in the white chocolate chips, if you're using them.

The dough will be very thick and sticky. Divide it in half, placing one half onto the middle of each cookie sheet. Place a small bowl of cold water nearby; you'll need to keep your hands wet in order to handle the dough. Shape each portion of dough into a shallow loaf shape, approximately t 9" by 3". The dough will expand considerably in the oven. Using a pastry brush, brush the beaten egg white onto each loaf; this will ensure a nice shiny top crust.

Bake for about 20 to 25 minutes, just until golden and firm to the touch. Leave the oven on, still at 325. Cool the loaves on their baking sheets for 10 minutes.

Using a very sharp, thin knife, slice the loaves widthwise, about 1/2" to 3/4" for each slice.

Place the slices on their sides (one cut side down) on the parchment covered baking sheets, and put them back into the oven. Bake until darker golden, about 10 minutes. When they're done, take them out and let them cool completely on their cookie sheets for at least an hour. Store them covered.

But before you store them, go get a cuppa joe, or a glass of milk, and start dipping!


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