An Almond Biscuit Disaster – The Cost of Having Too Much Faith in a Recipe
Welcome to the third instalment of my series where I test out recipes from an obscure 1990s Italian cookbook. This time, I tested a recipe from the ‘Cakes, Biscuits, & Breads’ section: Almond Biscuits (Biscotti di Mandorle):
I was quite excited to try my first sweet treat from the book but I’m sad to say that the final result was a bit of a disaster…
This is the first recipe which I made no alterations to, yet I found several issues along the way…
The egg whites are to be beaten into soft peaks but then simply ‘mixed’ in with the rest of the ingredients. I would have expected to be told to fold in these lovely, airy egg whites we’ve just spent so long beating into soft peaks:
The ratio of almonds to everything else in this recipe also seemed far too large, hence why the final taste wasn’t all that nice. Using 250g of ground almonds with just 40g sugar and a tablespoon of honey, I think these biscuits could have done with being a bit sweeter.
The recipe called for a ‘moderately hot’ oven temperature which is quite vague, especially for novice bakers. I’m convinced this was actually a recipe error as 160-180c for 40 minutes for any biscuit recipe seems far too hot for me – if anybody can please weigh in on this, leave a comment down below!
The sugary coating was a nice idea but it was very difficult to place neatly on top of the cookies. A spoon is used in the photographs but I had to resort to using my hands to press this crumbly mixture down:
Overall, these biscuits were disappointing and the recipe was quite unclear. As harsh as this may be, I have to give this a final recipe rating of:
1/10
Sadly, I will not be sharing a revised version of this recipe but instead leave you with an alternative Italian biscuit recipe which will hopefully guarantee you better results: Cantuccini
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Watch the baking process here:
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