Chocolate Almond Biscotti

215 gms brown sugar
250 gms all-purpose flour
3 Tbsp cocoa powder
2 Tbsp instant coffee
1 Tsp baking soda
1/4 Tsp salt
3 large eggs
1 1/2 Tsp vanilla
150 gms Almonds toasted & Chopped roughly 150 gms chocolate,roughly chopped



Preheat oven to 180C

To toast almonds: spread on a baking sheet and bake for 15 minutes or until lightly browned. Remove from the oven and place nuts in a bowl. Cool and then chop coarsely. Set aside while you prepare the dough.

Reduce temperature of oven to 150 degrees C. Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper.

Sift or whisk together the flour, cocoa, coffee, baking soda and salt into a bowl then set aside.

In the bowl beat the eggs and vanilla for about 30 seconds. Now mix in the chocolate/sugar and flour mixtures until a stiff dough forms, adding the almonds.

On a floured surface divide the dough in half. Form each half into a log 12 inches (30 cm) long. Do this by rolling the dough back and forth into a cylinder shape with floured hands. Transfer the logs to the baking sheet, spacing them well apart (width-wise on the pan), and pat to even the shapes. Bake until almost firm to the touch, about 35 - 40 minutes (logs will spread during baking). Remove from the oven, place on wire rack, and let cool for 10 minutes.

Transfer the logs to a cutting board. Using a serrated knife cut the dough into slices. Arrange the slices cut-side down on the baking sheet. Bake 15 minutes. Turn the slices over and bake until crisp and dry, about 15 minutes longer. Remove from oven and let cool on wire rack.

Rose Water Cookies

3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 cup almond meal
1/2 cup unsalted butter, at room temperature
3/4 cup powdered sugar, sifted
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp vanilla
1 tbsp rose water
1 large egg, at room temperature


Sift together the flour and almond meal into a small bowl and set aside. In a medium bow cream the butter until pale yellow. Add the powdered sugar, salt, vanilla, and rose water. Cream on medium speed until the mixture is smooth, add the egg and mix well. Add the flour mixture. Wrap the dough in a plastic and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes. Preheat the oven to 180C. Line a large baking sheet with a foil/parchment paper. Flour your hands. Pinch off pieces of dough and roll them into 1-inch balls. Place the balls about 1 inch apart on the prepared baking sheet. Bake the cookies for about 12 to 15 minutes, or until light golden around the edges.

Cornmeal Cookies

I just love baking as the aroma of butter & vanilla is so heavenly. Its been long I've baked any goodies so decided to make some cookies. Last week I tried baking Crunchy Oatmeal raisin cookies. Wasn’t very happy with their shapes as they came out flat but were very crunchy and tasty. I had some cornmeal stored so my search for cornmeal cookies begin and i bumped into these Italian Cornmeal cookies, “Crumiri”. Had all the ingredients in my kitchen shelf, so without wasting any time just off to bake them. Sabu was all excited to help me with the baking. She loves to cream the butter and sugar and finally she did the whole dough. Filled the dough in the pastry bag and Sabu was already with the piping bag running down with imagination as what shapes she should make. She happily piped out some ginger man, shirt, heart and various different shapes on the greased baking sheet. Baked the cookies in a preheated oven for 15 minutes and she was right next to the oven waiting impatiently for the cokies to come out of the oven. Side by side I spooned few cookie drops in another baking sheet. Few were sprinkled with pistachio powder and few I put 1 almond in the centre.

Ingredients :

180 gms unsalted butter
140 gms sugar
2 large eggs
1 tsp vanilla essence
240 gms all purpose flour
½ tsp salt
110 gms cornmeal

Preheat oven @ 180C. Grease the cookie sheet. Cream the butter & sugar until light and pluffy, add one eggs at a time, add vanilla essence now add the dry mixture of flour, cornmeal & salt. Mix well. Put the dough in a piping bag and and pipe out V , S or any shapes you like. I made few shapes and few dropped few with a tsp and sprinkled it with pistachio powder. Bake it for 15-18 minutes. Makes 3 dozen.