Biscotti Recipe

Italian Almond Cookies

 

Here are some of the materials you will need!

• Baking sheet
• A spoon
• A whisk
• 2 Large mixing bowls
• Measuring cups and spoons
• Parchment paper
• Sharp knife for chopping
• Serrated knife for slicing

Ingredients for Biscotti using butter:

• 1/2 cup roasted almonds, coarsely chopped
• 1 large egg
• grated zest of one lemon
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 4 tbsp unsalted butter, melted
• 1-1/4 cups all-purpose flour, spooned and leveled
• 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon table salt
• 1/2 teaspoon pure almond extract
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

Procedure: Part 1

1. First preheat your oven to 350°F

2. Next put all the almonds onto the baking sheet and put them in the oven for approximately 15 minutes, and remove them when the almonds are browned and fragrant as pictured below.  Once the almonds are cooled chop them very finely with the sharp knife. Note- you must keep the oven on after removing the almonds.

3. Then you will combine all the wet ingredients together in a mixing bowl and whisk them together; eggs, lemon zest, sugar, butter, almond extract and vanilla.

4. In another mixing bowl, combine all the dry ingredients; the chopped almonds, flour, baking powder, and salt. Gradually add the flour mixture to the egg mixture, stirring thoroughly with a spoon. Once the dry and wet ingredients are combined stir together until the dough is stiff.

5. Take the dough out of the bowl and place it onto a baking sheet with parchment paper. Shape your dough into a log about 6-8 inches long, 1 inch high, and 3 inches wide.  The dough should be sticky so you may need to wet your hands in order to form the dough shape.

6. Once the dough is shaped put it in the oven for 14 minutes and then rotate the sheet and bake the dough for an additional 14 minutes. When the loaf is done cooking take it out of the oven and let it cool for about 12 to 15 minutes. The biscotti should look like the picture below.

 

Procedure: Part 2 Twice Baked

1. When the loaf is cooling reduce the oven temperature to 250°F.

2. After the biscotti has cooled use the serrated knife and slice it into ½-inch-thick pieces.

3. Next place the biscotti on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper, spacing them ½-inch apart and bake for 7 minutes. Rotate the baking sheet and bake for an additional 7 more minutes, or until the biscotti are slightly crisp

4. Finally remove them from the oven and let the biscotti cool completely.

 

Your biscotti should be crisp and you should be able to see some of the almonds peeking through the middle!

Below is the end result of the Biscotti Van and I made!

When we made our biscotti we made it with butter but the lab group next to us, Elise and Nikki, made their biscotti with olive oil instead. Below is the side by side comparison of the completely cooled olive oil biscotti and butter biscotti, and in both pictures above and below you can see the interior texture of both types of biscotti. In the video at the bottom of the page the comparison between the two types are discussed.

Lab Questions

1. Why is butter a solid at room temperature while olive oil is a liquid.

Butter is a solid at room temperature because it is considered a solid fat. Butter is 50% Saturated and 50% unsaturated fatty acids and olive oil on the other hand is a liquid fat consisting of 85% Cis unsaturated and polyunsaturated and 15% saturated fatty acids. Solid and liquid fat is based on the type of fatty acid in the triglycerides.

2. Butter is a fat that contains ~15% water, compared to olive oil (or shortening) which contains < 1% water. Explain the textures of the two different types of biscotti.

When a food has a higher water content the end product is more moist, tender and chewy where as foods with a low water content are hard, dry, and tough and have a crunch to them. Since butter is 15% water and olive oil has less than 1% of water in it, this explains why the butter biscotti was more soft and chewy compared to the more dry and hard olive oil biscotti. In olive oil there is a lower water content so the end product will be more crisp and dry, while butter has more water present so the end product will still be crisp but will be more soft and chewy than an olive oil biscotti.

3. When mixing the ingredients you added the flour mixture slowly to the fat/oil mixture. What effect does the fat/oil have on gluten formation in the dough? What about your biscotti supports your conclusion?

The oil coats the flour therefore making the oil/fat mixture to prevent the gluten from being formed. However, there is still enough gluten for the dough to be cohesive. When little gluten is in a mixture it causes the end product to crumble, just like our biscotti did when you bit into it, and it makes it more dense instead of light texture which is a correct description of our biscotti.

Below is the video discussing the Biscotti we made!

http://vimeo.com/256852087