Tuesday, December 20, 2011

Christmas Cookie Exchange; Gingerbread Biscotti


I love the festive season. The twinkling lights, shimmering baubles, excitement at the thoughts of Father Christmas shimmying down the chimney and yuletide songs on the radio all get me into the festive spirit but nothing more so than the enticing smells and flavours of Christmas! Cinnamon, cloves, candied peel, chutneys, mincemeat, cakes and puddings are all flavours and smells that I absolutely love so when the lovely @wisemona emailed me with her recipe for Gingerbread Biscotti I knew I would love it.  Its far from fancy coffees I was reared but oh my I do love a Starbucks Gingerbread Latte and lo and behold this very recipe comes from Starbucks so I knew it would be a winner!


Gingerbread Biscotti

Ingredients

  • 80 ml (1/3 cup) vegetable oil
  • 200 g (1 cup) white sugar
  • 3 eggs
  • 40 oz (1/4 cup) treacle/ molasses
  • 270 g (2 1/4 cups) all-purpose (cream/plain) flour
  • 110 g (1 cup) whole wheat flour
  • 1 tablespoon baking powder
  • 1 1/2 tablespoons ground ginger
  • 3/4 tablespoon ground cinnamon
  • 1/2 tablespoon ground cloves
  • 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg

Directions

  1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C). Grease a cookie sheet.
  2. In a large bowl, mix together oil, sugar, eggs, and treacle/molasses. In another bowl, combine flours, baking powder, ginger, cinnamon, cloves, and nutmeg; mix into egg mixture to form a stiff dough.
  3. Divide dough in half, and shape each half into a roll the length of the cookie. Place rolls on cookie sheet, and pat down to flatten the dough to 1/2 inch thickness.
  4. Bake in preheated oven for 25 minutes. Remove from oven, and set aside to cool.
  5. When cool enough to touch, cut into 1/2 inch thick diagonal slices. Place sliced biscotti on cookie sheet, and bake an additional 5 to 7 minutes on each side, or until toasted and crispy.


Once these gorgeous biscotti were cooled I melted 100g of 70% cocoa chocolate and drizzled it on top. We were having a festive night out in one of our friends houses at the weekend so I brought these along with a bottle of baileys biscotti flavour to accompany them. Perfect to dip into those after dinner baileys coffees!