Pistachio and sour cherry biscotti

With a desire to make something sweet to suit the recent burst of hot weather, I decided to venture into the world of Italian biscotti. The word biscotti, like biscuit, means twice cooked. This is an important part of the baking because the biscuit needs to dry out a lot to become very crunchy.

I took inspiration from this recipe and this other recipe to create my own little golden almondy slices.

Alors, here is my own recipe, with no mention of cups as measures and no confusing typos. There is definitely room to mess around with the ingredients. Swap pistachios for almonds or pecan nuts, use any fruit zest, ignore the vanilla essence and add more almond; any biscotti is good biscotti! I also used a few glacé cherries so I didn't have to buy two packets of the sour kind. The rolled oats are also totally optional and pretty untraditional.

250g plain flour
125g caster sugar
75g rolled oats
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
3 free-range eggs, beaten
225g (ish) unsalted and shelled peanuts, roughly chopped
225g (ish) dried sour cherries
2 tbsps olive oil
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp almond extract
Zest of 1 lemon
Zest of 1 orange

Preheat oven to 180°C, line a baking tin with greaseproof paper. Whisk together the eggs, lemon and orange zest, vanilla and almond extract in a big bowl. In a separate bowl, combine the flour, sugar, oats, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Add in the egg, cherries and nuts then mix again.

Transfer the dough onto a floured work surface and divide in half. Use plenty of flour on your hands to shape each half into logs roughly 12 inches long and 3 inches wide. Transfer the logs onto the baking trays. Bake for 25-30 minutes, until browned and set, turning halfway through. Remove the biscotti logs from the oven and let them cool. Reduce the oven temperature to 120°C.

Using a serrated knife, cut the biscotti logs diagonally, about a half inch wide. Arrange the biscotti back on the baking tray (it might be necessary to use two) and bake again for 30 minutes, turning over halfway through. Keep them in an airtight container and they will last a long time. Check that your grandparents have sturdy teeth before encouraging them to eat it too.