Nuts and fruits biscotti

Places aren't made of buildings. Places are made of people. Let me explain. As much as cities are a concoction of streets, houses and crosswalks, the spirit of a city is made out of the people that live in it. I'm sure you agree with that. 

Boston area is a complicated place to live in. Winters are hard and snowy, summers can be crazy hot or crazy rainy and you never know what the weather's gonna be like in 5 minutes. This weather makes people sort of cold. Disciplined, organized, efficient and hard working, but cold. I've been lucky. I found myself surrounded by people from very different places, that ended up in the same place (my ex lab) and tried to bond together and be almost family to each other.

I'm leaving this city in less than two months. And my two best buddies and ex-labmates are leaving too. We're all going in different directions and hoping for e-mails and phone calls to keep us close. Our other common friend, L, is staying here. And because we've spent many hours together and shared some of the best moments in these (for me) last two years, it is not easy for her to see us leaving.

I like to see her happy, so I made her these biscotti. They are full of all sorts of goodness. Nuts? you name them, they are here. Pine nuts, hazelnuts, walnuts. Dried fruit? cranberries and apricots. Brown sugar and honey. It can't get much better than this. 

I adapted the recipe, with lots of changes from here. You can definitely play around with the nuts or the fruits. I replaced cane sugar for brown sugar + honey and they are not super sweet but have a depth of flavor that only honey can give. Also, I omitted liquors in the recipe and changed them for soy milk. Make sure you add a couple tablespoons of liquid, whether it's water, milk or alcohol, otherwise the dough is to hard to work with when you add the nuts and fruits. 

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2 cups unbleached all purpose flour

3/4 cups whole wheat pastry flour

1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1/4 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup butter, melted

1/2 cup brown sugar

1 tablespoon honey

3 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla

2 tablespoons soy milk

1/2 cup hazelnuts

1/2 cup dried cranberries

1/2 cup dried apricots

1/4 cup walnuts

1/4 cup pine nuts

Preheat oven to 375 F

In a bowl whisk together flours, baking soda and baking powder. Set aside. In another bowl mix the melted butter, sugar and honey. Stir in the vanilla and add the eggs one at a time while mixing. Add the dry mixture about 1/2 cup at a time. Finish mixing it in with a spoon (dough will be hard). Add the soy milk, this makes the dough softer and easier to work with. Add the nuts and dried fruits and incorporate them into the dough  mixing with a wooden spoon. It will take a bit of work but it's totally worth it.  

Divide the dough in half and shape it into two logs about half inch thick. Bake them for about 25 minutes or until hard to the touch. Take them out of the oven (don't turn it off), let them cool a bit and cut them into 1/2 inch wide biscotti. Place the biscotti cut side down and bake them for another 15 to 20 minutes until crispy. I like to flip them half way through the baking time so they are equally toasted on both sides. 

Cranberry white chocolate oatmeal cookies

Do this guys sound familiar? yes, I know, I already updated an oatmeal cranberry cookie recipe. But this one has chocolate!

Last Friday it was my friend JM's bday. He lives in Atlanta so he got a package in the mail with one of my Spanish easter cakes and a box of these cookies. Not bad huh?

I wanted to try a new recipe for oatmeal-whatever cookies. Because you can really add whatever it is you want. Raisins? Apricot? Dark chocolate?. Your choice. Plus they have oatmeal. That makes them healthy, right? Right.

It didn't take me long to find a right combo of ingredients. This recipe comes from the 'Craisins' bag.

2/3 cup butter
2/3 cup brown sugar
2 large eggs
1 1/2 cups old fashioned oats
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 cups dried cranberries
2/3 cup white chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350 F.
Cream butter and sugar together until fluffly. Mix in the eggs one at a time. In a bowl, combine oats, flour and baking soda. Add to the wet mixture and mix well. Stir in the cranberries and chocolate chips and incorporate with a spatula. Drop by tablespoonfuls in an ungreased baking sheet. Press with a fork to flatten (they don't get flat during baking). Bake for 15 min or until lightly golden.

For the love of cranberries

My love story with cranberries was love at first sight. Unfortunately I didn't even know of the existence of this delicious round little things until I moved to the US. Apparently some countries in Europe have them, but Spain didn't until pretty much a year ago and they definitely don't have the fresh stuff.  (did i say they? i guess i'm an adopted american now).

Anyway, as soon as I tried them... I fell in love. Needless to say, cranberry sauce is one of my favourite Thanksgiving dishes. I could just eat tablespoons of it. Plain tart yummy cranberry.

The dried sweetened ones go perfect in my salads and... combined with some oatmeal... a little healthier breakfast cookies!

Fast, easy, delicious cookies!

3/4 cups all purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1 stick of butter

1/2 cup dark brown sugar

1 egg

1 1/2 cups old fashioned oats

1 cup dried sweetened cranberries

Preheat oven to 350 F

Cream butter and sugar in a bowl until fluffy. Add the egg and mix well. Stir in the baking powder and flour. Don't overmix. Fold in the oats and cranberries. It will look like there's no way in hell you're gonna get all those cranberries incorporated in the dough, but don't worry, they will stick to the cookies. Drop the dough by 2 tablespoonfuls in a cookie sheet. Flatten them as they won't get flat through baking. Bake for 10 min or until slightly brown on the bottom.

They are so easy and yummy you'll be making them over and over. 

Christmas cookie giveaway part 2

The second set of recipes from the cookie boxes my friends got for xmas.

Orange coconut cookies

They don't look amazing but I promise these were the stars of the party... chewy, flavorful, with a crunch from the coconut... 

2 cups all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons orange zest
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup butter
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/4 cup packed light brown sugar
1 large egg
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup shredded sweetened coconut

Preheat oven to 350 F

Combine the flour, zest, and salt in a large bowl and whisk until combined.  Beat together butter and sugars  until fluffy. Add the egg and vanilla and mix until just combined. Add the flour and mix well. Stir in the coconut and mix. Refrigerate the dough for about an hour. Drop by tablespoonfuls in a cookie sheet and bake for about 10 min until edges are golden.




Cranberry walnut bars


The easiest bars you've ever made! And if you're not a fan of cranberries or walnuts you can use any other type of dried fruit/nut you like. Warning! they are yummy but sticky!

1/2 cup (1 stick) salted butter, cut into pieces
1 1/2 cups graham crackers crumbs (you can crush them with whatever you like, food processor is the cool way but I used a hammer ;) )
1 1/2 cup of walnuts, chopped
1/3 cup condensed milk

Preheat oven to 350 F

Melt the butter in the microwave and stir in the graham cracker crumbs. Mix well and place in an oven pan forming a crust (this will be the crust of the bars). I made a thin crust but I think next time I'll try with a thicker one so the bars hold shape better. On top of the crust, spread the cranberries and walnuts. Drizzle the condensed milk on top and press with a fork so that everything sticks together. Bake for 25 min until the top is golden brown. Important!!! Let them cool well before cutting, otherwise it's really hard to get nice looking bars.

Dried Fruitcake

Fruitcake is another one of this super traditional american xmas recipes... My only problem, I don't like candied fruit. Instead I went with just dried fruit. Obviously there's a thousand recipes with different amounts  and varieties of fruits and nuts. I made my life easy and added a bag of trail mix that had dried pinapple, cranberries, almonds and macadamia nuts. For an extra nutty bread I added walnuts but you can add whatever nut you prefer.

3 Cups Flour
1 1/4 Tbsp baking powder
2 stick butter
1 1/2 cups sugar

1 tsp. vanilla extract
3 eggs
1 cupmilk
1 bag trail mix (about 2 cups of mixed dried fruits and nuts)
1 cup walnuts

Preheat the oven at 350 F.
In a large mixing bowl, cream the butter and the sugar until light and fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Add the flour and the baking powder. Stir in the dried fruits and nuts. Bake for an hour or until a toothpick comes out clean.

It might seem like a lot of baking powder, but it's a really thick bread and that baking powder makes it grow this much

Although I wasn't sure about the quality of it, I took it to work and left it around there, hoping nobody would say, this is the worst fruitcake ever. Surprisingly, my coworkers found it excellent and I even got asked for the recipe a couple times!

Italian delicacies

As most of you know, biscotti means double baked. And this is pretty much the only secret of these delicacies that I had the pleasure to find very easy to make. Plus, you can make biscotti of whatever you imagine, sweet or savory, with nuts, dried fruit, chocolate... try it!

CRANBERRY PECAN BISCOTTI

2-1/2 cups flour
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup butter, softened
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
1-1/2 teaspoons orange extract
1/2 cup pecan (or any nut you like)
1/2 cup cranberries (again, any dried fruit works)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

In a bowl cream butter and sugar until fluffy.  Add eggs one at a time and keep mixing. Gradually, add the flour, salt and baking powder to butter mixture. Mix until smooth and add the pecans and cranberries.

Evenly divide dough into 2 portions and shape them like bread loaves. Place on baking sheet. Bake for 30 minutes. Remove from oven. Let them cool down for about 15 minutes. Cut loaves diagonally into 1/2 to 1-inch slices with a serrated knife. Line slices back on baking sheet. Bake for five more minutes on until they look slightly golden. Turn the biscotti over and bake for another 5 minutes.

Adding chocolate dip is optional. If you want to do it, just let the biscotti cool down completely. Then melt about half a cup of chocolate chips in the microwave and dip the biscotti in. Let them cool until the chocolate is firm and they are ready to go.