Pistachio Cherry Biscotti

These pistachio and dried cherry biscotti were another item on the Baked: New Frontiers in Baking recipe schedule that I waffled on making. I just don’t really like biscotti, because in my opinion, they’re basically an overcooked cookie. I realize they’re meant to be dunked in coffee, which softens them up, but then you get crumbs in your coffee and honestly, it’s a really inefficient way to eat a cookie.

I haven’t made biscotti in over a decade and the only reason I made it so many years ago was as part of the catering work I did in college for Café Opus. In baking biscotti for those catered events, I realized something crucial: I like biscotti when it’s only baked once. So, I’d start a batch, slice off a piece for myself, then cut the rest and bake them a second time until they became “proper” crunchy biscotti.

With that lesson in mind, I made a compromise. I would follow the recipe schedule and make these pistachio cherry biscotti, but I would bake them for myself, rather than as instructed.

It feels like I’m repeating myself here, but I imagine that not everyone who reads this post has necessarily read all my prior Baked Sunday Mornings posts on Baked: New Frontiers in Baking. So… this cookbook is not as precise or informative in the directions accompanying each recipe. Also, recipe amounts are only given in volumes. Consequently, I start my forays into baking these recipes by first converting the volumes to their metric equivalents, and then describe for myself what visual cues I should be waiting for at each step in order to succeed.

As cookies go, these biscotti were really easy to make. I beat the eggs and sugar for 4-5 minutes, until the batter was really voluminous and thick, then added my flour and gently incorporated it at low speed. At this point, the batter was really pale, sticky, and highly reminiscent of a soft nougat in terms of consistency and “stretchiness”. I found that some of the beaten egg-sugar mixture still hadn’t fully incorporated into the egg-sugar-flour dough, so I did my best to fold everything together properly at the same time I folded in the pistachios and cherries.

I formed a very rough rectangular log by scooping out the thick dough onto a standard-sized baking sheet; I didn’t bother with measuring the length, width, or height. I just flattened the top and evened out the sides as best I could and assumed it was roughly 10x14-inches and about ¾-1 inch tall. This I baked for exactly 20 minutes at 350 F, at which point it had picked up a little golden brown color on the surface. I let it rest for 10 minutes, then cut the rectangle vertically (parallel with the shorter side), yielding approximately 12 giant biscotti (a lot fewer than the projected 3 dozen). The edge pieces were already cooked through and I set those aside, but the inside of the log was not baked through and thus super sticky. The sticky nature of the interior of the "log" made it really difficult to cut the pieces evenly, and most of them came out rather misshapen. I laid these pieces out on the baking sheet with the cut side up/down, skipped the egg white wash, and put my giant pistachio cherry biscotti back in the oven for another 20 minutes (at 325 F), at which point they had just cooked through in the center and were still quite soft and tender.

Baked this way, I really liked these – even more than I expected to. They were nice and soft, ridiculously easy to eat, and great with maple butter or vanilla ice cream. I'm not so sure I'll turn to this recipe frequently, but if I do have the itch to make biscotti, I'd certainly revisit these (maybe with some chocolate added to the dough for good measure).

Head over to Baked Sunday Mornings for the recipe and to see what the other bakers thought of these pistachio cherry biscotti (or the hazelnut chocolate cinnamon version).