Sultana and Clementine Biscotti

I have been making loads of biscotti these last few weeks - ideal for holiday food gifts.  This recipe is flavoured with sultana and clementine zest.  I hope you enjoy :)

preparation time: 10-15 minutes
cooking time: 25-30 minutes
makes about 35-40 biscotti

ingredients:
300g plain flour
1 tsp baking powder
175g sugar
2 eggs
zest of 1 clementine/orange
100 g sultanas
1 tsp vanilla extract

Step 1: Preheat the Oven and Prepare Your Baking Sheets

• preheat the oven to 150C and grease and line your baking sheets

Step 2: Whisk the Sugar, Eggs and Vanilla

• add the sugar, eggs and vanilla essence to a bowl and whisk with an electric mixer until thickened, fluffy and doubled in size - this should take a few minutes

Step 3: Add the Other Ingredients...

• fold in the flour, baking powder, sultanas, clementine zest, baking powder and mix until incorporated and a dough is formed. 

Step 4: Shape the Biscotti Dough

• tip out the dough onto a floured surface and shape into flattened 'sausage' shapes - about 5cm wide and 2cm high then place onto a greased baking sheet with a few inches space between each one.

Step 5: First Bake...

• bake for about 15 minutes until light brown/golden and firm to the touch

Step 6: The Second Bake

• cut the biscotti into 1.5cm slices and place back on baking trays - continue to bake for another 12-15 minutes - until golden brown

Step 7: Remove From Oven and Enjoy :)

• remove from the oven and leave to cool on a rack before storing in an airtight container.  These keep well for several weeks.

You can check out my other recipes on:  http://chipbuttiesandnoodlesoup.blogspot.co.uk/

Comments

[wazzup105]

Last update (for now)...

After the first 15 minutes they were pretty sticky, and cutting them neatly was hard to do. Not the nice coockies as depicted in the ible.

After the second bake I left them in the oven for 5 - 10 minutes longer.. They were reasonably hardened by then, but once they cooled off they were perfect. Nice and crunchy whith just a hint of chewiness (mainly from the raisins).

I WILL make these again (maybe the aniseed ones next time) I'll try to be more exact in what I am doing next time. This time it almost came as an afterthought (threw the sugar in with the flour, so I had to fish that out again, forgot the baking powder, forgot to tarra the scale back to zero ... ah well they still worked !)

[wazzup105]

They're in the oven right now... I must say that I think they're pretty soft. I was expecting them to firm up more... Will they firm up more after I remove them from the oven ? (I did half your recipe and added less sugar and also swapped half the flour for oatmeal because I didn't have enough flour)

[wazzup105]

low fat biscotti.. sweet (actually a bit too much sugar for my liking, but I can probably fix that)

[chipbuttiesandnoodlesoup]

Thanks - I thought about trying with less sugar too...let me know how you get on :)

[MissAnubis]

These aren't sultanas. Sultanas are raisins from yellow grapes.