Chocolate Cherry Biscotti

Twelve Days of Cookie Baking — Day 12

Create memories your families and friends will savor for years to come

Jenna Vavra and Angie Fracassi, former coworkers and good friends, started making these distinctive “dunking cookies” together at Christmastime about five years ago.

Biscotti means “twice baked” in Italian, which is how these attractive sweets gain their crunchy, chewy, crispy characteristic texture.

“These are great cookies for gifts because they last all through the holiday season,” Jenna said. “At times I’ve packaged each one individually in a cellophane bag with a ribbon. A single piece packaged this way makes a great gift when combined with a pretty coffee mug and package of hot chocolate.

“Biscotti is also perfect on a tray with other assorted treats,” Jenna continued. “Most of my holiday baking is for gift-giving. My “top secret” favorite is creating homemade flavored marshmallows — peppermint, chocolate and vanilla with real vanilla beans. I also make some “basics,” such as Peanut Butter Blossoms, Saltine Toffee Cookies, and a sugar cookie that is an ‘icebox variety.’ ” CJK

Chocolate Cherry Biscotti

(Jenna Vavra)

1/2 cup butter, softened

3/4 cup white sugar

3 eggs

2 tsp. almond extract

3 cups all purpose flour

2 tsp. baking powder

1/2 cup chopped red candied cherries

1/2 cup mini semi-sweet chocolate chips

12 oz. pkg white chocolate chips

1-3 tbsp. milk or cream

Preheat oven to 350 °F. Grease a large cookie sheet.

In a large bowl, cream together butter and sugar until smooth. Beat in eggs one at a time, then stir in almond extract. Combine flour and baking powder separately and stir into creamed mixture until just blended. Mix in candied cherries and mini chocolate chips.

With lightly floured hands, shape dough into two 10-inch loaves. Place rolls 5 inches apart on prepared cookie sheet and flatten each to 3-inch width.

Bake 20-25 minutes until set and light golden brown. Cool 10 minutes. Using serrated knife, cut loaves diagonally into 1/2-inch slices. Arrange slices cut side down on ungreased cookie sheets.

Bake for 8-10 minutes until bottoms begin to brown. Turn and bake an additional 5 minutes or until browned and crisp. Cool completely.

Melt white chocolate in microwave, stirring every 20-30 seconds until smooth. Add milk or cream until it is desired consistency — thin enough to work with. Drizzle cookies with melted white chocolate. Let harden. Store in tightly covered container.

Yield: 36 biscotti

  

A note from Jenna: I have used this recipe that I found on Allrecipes.com for years. For baking and cooking it’s my favorite search engine because of all of the reviews that are added to the recipes.

I always flour my hand before trying to form the dough. Wetting them would likely work equally well.

I like to dip half of each biscotti in the melted white chocolate rather than drizzling it as called for in the original recipe.

A note from Carol: Jenna loves to cook and bake — she’s constantly searching for new recipes and giving them a try. FFF readers may remember her chocolate raspberry layer cake and lemon macaroons. She does billing and transcribing for the St. Cloud Diocesan Tribunal and is a senior design consultant for Willow House. Jenna and her husband, Corin, and their daughters Carley Ann (8) and Audrey (1), are members of St. Paul Parish in St. Cloud.