Most Italian anise biscotti use anise seeds, but mine uses star anise with cardamom, nutmeg, and a host of other spices to give this biscotti layers of flavor that pairs beautifully with a spiced tea (or on it’s own as a little treat)!
When I first taught myself how to make biscotti, I had no idea that it was considered a complicated cookie. Most people shy away from making biscotti because you have to bake it twice. While the double bake can cause complications (more on that in the notes section), the real complexity with biscotti is the sticky dough.
Traditional biscotti only uses eggs as the liquid source and forms a very stiff and sticky dough. Most people will tell you to use wet hands when you’re molding the dough for the first bake, but the traditional dough is so stiff that I could barley make a cohesive dough (I was using a mixing bowl and spoon). To help make things easier, my recipe cheats just a smidge by adding in 1/4 cup of neutral oil. This helps make the dough more workable and keep the biscotti a bit softer, which means you can enjoy it while dunking into a hot cup of coffee or tea, but also on it’s own as a crunchy snack.
This recipe makes approximately 24 cookies.
Ingredients
- 200 g all-purpose flour
- 140 g plain white sugar
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp ground star anise
- 1/2 tsp ground cardamom
- 1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1/4 cup neutral oil, like vegetable
- 2 large eggs
- 1 cup chopped almonds
Directions
- Preheat the oven to 350F (180C) and line a baking sheet with a silicone slip mat (my preferred option for biscotti) or parchment paper. The heft of the slip mat helps keep everything in it’s place when you’re shaping the log
- Whisk all the dry ingredients (flour, salt, baking powder, and spices) with the sugar in a large mixing bowl
- Drizzle the vegetable oil over the dry ingredients and add the 2 eggs. Using a wooden spoon or a stiff rubber spatula, mix everything together. When the dough has almost come together, add the almonds and stir in
- Try to gather the dough into a ball using your wooden spoon or spatula and dump the whole dough onto you prepared baking sheet. Now comes the messy part: you can try to shape the dough into a log using the spoon or spatula, or you can try using a bowl scraper or your hands (slightly wet). This part will always be a little messy and use whatever tools you have at your disposal to get an even ~ 1 in tall and ~4 in wide rectangle / log. If you’re really struggling with this step, try cutting a sheet of plastic wrap or putting on food safe gloves and molding the log with your hands. You can also make 2 smaller logs instead.
- Once you have it shaped, bake for approximately 20 minutes. It will rise and expand slightly, but should be completely baked through at the center. The center will be a lighter golden brown and the edges will be a bit darker. If it still feels very soft when you give a gentle push on the center, keep it in for another 5 minutes. Remove and let cool on the pan for at least 10 minutes
- Move to a cooling rack and cool for another 5 minutes. Once cool enough to handle, transfer to a cutting board. Using a thin, sharp knife, start slicing the log on an angle. Each biscotti should be ~0.75 in (~2 cm) wide. If you have a long and wide log, you may want to slice it in half (at an angle) to make the whole log easier to handle
- Arrange all the slices on the baking sheet, now without any lining, cut side down. Bake for another 8 minutes on each side. Adjust the timing as needed based on the thickness of the biscotti. Let the biscotti cool on a cooling rack for 10 minutes. If at this point they are not as crunchy or snappy as you’d like, you can put them back in the oven for another ~5 minutes per side, but keep an eye on them to avoid burning. Once cooled, store in an airtight container. Biscotti will last for weeks if stored properly
Notes
Baking time & temperature: During the first bake, avoid underbaking the log. If the log is not baked through, it will start falling apart when you slice the biscotti. That’s why I like giving a gentle poke at the center of the log using my finger or the back of a spoon. If it gives easily, bake it for longer. If the edges are on the verge of getting burnt, turn the temperature down to 300F (150C) until baked through.
During the second bake, avoid burning the biscotti. The cookies are small and can go from golden brown to burnt fairly easily. The goal is more so to “dehydrate” the cookie than it is to bake it, so if your oven runs hot, definitely turn down the temperature.
Flavor profile & substitutions: This recipe can be used as a base biscotti recipe. Feel free to swap out the spices and nuts to make your own flavor profile. If you want a chocolate base recipe, drop the flour down to 140g and add 40g of cocoa powder. I like making a triple chocolate and cashew biscotti using this ratio and substituting the 1 cup of chopped almonds for 1 cup of a combination of chopped cashews, white chocolate chips, and mini semi sweet chocolate chips. A dried cherry, pistachio, and chocolate biscotti would be delicious, as would a hazelnut, coffee, and chocolate biscotti.