Melt in your mouth cookies......

These cookies are not what most people think of as biscotti but they're what I grew up with in my Italian family. My Nani (grandmother) told me that Biscotti meant little cookie - not the twice baked Biscotti we all know of in the stores and bakeries........actually I never knew about the twice baked ones until around 20 years ago. These Biscotti are melt in your mouth cookies - one of my favorites. In our family they were only made for Christmas but I've been known to make them all throughout the year using different colored sprinkles, such as reds & pinks for Valentine's Day.

Biscotti

5 cups flour

3 eggs

1 cup butter

1 ½ cups confectioners sugar, sifted

1 tbs baking powder

1 tbs almond extract

1/8 tb salt
 

Sift flour, sugar, salt and baking powder into bowl. Cut butter using fingers into dry ingredients until mixture resembles a coarse cornmeal. Make a well in flour and break eggs into it. Add flavoring. Knead dough about 2 minutes or until smooth.
 

Add a little more flour, if necessary, should the dough seems too soft and sticky. If too stiff, add about 1 tbs milk or as needed. Dough should be medium soft.
 

Take a handful of dough. Roll out into an 18 inch rope, ½ inch thick. Cut into 1 ½” pieces. Place on a greased cookie sheet about 1 ½ inches apart. Bake at 375 for 8-10 minutes – do not let brown, bake until right before they brown. (Caution: it’s best to watch cookies after 8 minutes) Remove from oven. Cool 5 minutes and frost. Sprinkle with multi-color sprinkles. Sit to dry. Store in an air tight container.
 

Basic frosting for Biscotti

1 lb confectioners sugar

4 tbs boiling water

¼ tsp almond extract

1 tbs butter
 

Mix until smooth and spread on cookies. If frosting is too thick, add more boiling water, a little at a time. Decorate with multi-color sprinkles.
 

Note: you can substitute anise extract for almond extract. My Nani put drops of yellow food coloring in the dough – I don’t. My Nani also split the icing into two bowls and put red food coloring in one, green in the other – I don’t do this either – I like my icing white. I have fond memories of helping my Nani make the Christmas cookies each year – we usually had around 15 different kinds that came out Christmas Eve on huge silver trays. There were tins and tins of cookies that kept filling these trays throughout the holidays. These are one of my favorites – they just melt in my mouth.

 

Rude awakening to the morning.......

Interesting morning here today......Sam left for the gym at 5am, I was almost back to sleep when I heard him slip sliding back up the icy drive. I figured he forgot his clothes for the office but no, there was an overturned lumber truck in the ditch alongside our drive down on the road. There were two fire trucks there already, fire fighter came over to tell Sam to turn himself around and get back up the drive as the power pole at the edge of the drive was cracked, the line 10 ft from the ground, arcing and burning.....easier said than done to get turned around on ice and back uphill on the 1/3 mile driveway. He ran in the house and jumped in the shower figuring we'd lose power any minute which means we lose well water. I jumped out of bed, boxed up etsy orders, printed postage. It was 3 hours before we lost power but then it was off for several hours. No leaving the property as the power company was using our driveway to put in a new pole and had all the wire laying running up the drive. Our road has been closed all day, once the power was repaired the lumber company was out there picking up the load. Sam has just left here hoping to get out with my orders to the post office. Phone box down on the road was also hit with wires hanging out but not disconnected - we have phone and internet but we've put a call in to them to come repair it. Truck broke a good portion of our concrete culvert - supposedly it will be fixed according to the owner that Sam and neighbor Merle talked when they ventured down the drive. Heard the driver had a broken clavicle, bumps and bruises and was taken to the hospital but is doing ok.

All this on a day when we finally had sun - no frozen fog - but still the below freezing temps and snow and ice from the snowstorm 2 weeks ago plus a trace of freezing rain overnight - there was ice all over the roads here in the north valley.

Of course no power totally changed my day - everything I planned to do today required power. I spun for a bit, wrapped gifts once it was light enough to see in the room I had everything stashed in, then I spun again. I could have knit on Sam's socks but he was here and they're a gift....not quite sure if I'll get them done in time for Christmas as he's with me for almost everyday between now and then......oh well, into the Christmas stocking still on the needles.

When the power came back on I decided to bake my Nani's (Italian grandmother) biscotti cookies, one of my favorites. This is the kind of biscotti I grew up, I had never heard of the biscotti we see these days in the stores where it's twice baked, hard and crunchy, these are soft and melt in your mouth lovely. I have the best memories of helping her bake all kinds of Christmas cookies every year - this is the only one I'm baking this year.

I mixed up the dough and then rolled it out into logs and cut those into small bite-size morsels. My grandmother actually made her a two bite cookie.

Here they are ready to go in the oven - they have almond flavoring in them - yum

Here they are out of the oven - they're not meant to be browned or they'll taste dry

 

And here they are iced with a simple confectioners sugar icing with almond flavoring and then sprinkled with non-pariels - I restrained myself, I usually put many more on. Nani split up the icing and used food coloring to make half with green icing and half with red icing - I kind of like the look of white.

Road report - Sam is back from the post office.....our road is still closed but they were letting those who live on it get in and out. The entire thing is graveled because of the ice. He said it looks like there's at least another 2 hours work of loading all that wood onto another trailer. No mail today, guess they wouldn't let the mail person past the barricade to deliver.

Yum cookies

Just finished what small amount of cookie baking I'll be doing for Christmas and they're not the traditional ones the family makes. Some almond coconut macaroons and some chocolate cookies rolled in Oregon hazelnuts (thank you Shirley) with a bit of frosting and a hersheys kiss in the center - all I have to say is yum! Perfect snowy day activity.