I make all of the gifts I give to friends and family each year, well, except for the gifts I give to my children. I’m sure they would be verklempt if I gave them a gift basket of cookies, caramel, mustard and liqueur…after all they can have that stuff anytime so it’s nothing special. This past weekend I decided to make some holiday gifts for the kids in my life. My kids are grown and it’s been a long time since I was a room mother and did things like this all the time but I’m hoping I haven’t lost the touch completely and that they’ll enjoy the decorated biscotti done just for them.
I’m hoping to catch my neighbor Sally’s grand-daughter Skylar who seems to have gone from a baby to a young lady overnight and who I made the Christmas tree biscotti for and packaged in this cute bag. I missed Skylar over Halloween; hope this makes up for that!
For Aaron, the 16 year old boy down the street who I’ve known since he was old enough to walk up to my door and sell me something to support his elementary school (I do believe I still have some of the rolls of wrapping paper I’ve purchased over those many years). Aaron’s family is Jewish but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t like homemade holiday goodies and I did my best to make some with Hanukkah colors just for him.
When my friend Ansh comes to visit this week she’s bringing her young daughter who I’ve wanted to meet for some time. Ansh is Indian and makes the most amazing food…albeit SPICY so I thought something about the orange conveyed a bit of heat (although they were actually my favorite – orange and chocolate M&M’s? YES!) but also a lot of sweet; just like Ansh.
Serves 1
20 minCook Time
20 minTotal Time
Save RecipeIngredients
- Cranberry-Almond Chocolate Biscotti
- Ingredients
- 1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
- 3/4 cups sugar
- 1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
- 2 teaspoons baking soda
- 1/8 teaspoon salt
- 3 large eggs
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 1/4 cup unsalted butter, melted
- 1 cup dried cranberries
- 1 cup sliced almonds
- 8 ounces of Dove Promises Silky Smooth Dark Chocolate
- 1 Small package M&M Chocolate Candie
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees and place 1 rack in top third and 1 rack in bottom third.
- LIne 2 rimmed baking sheets with parchment paper.
- Sift together flour, sugar, cocoa powder, baking soda and salt.
- Whisk eggs and vanilla together in medium bowl. Beat egg mixture,then melted butter into dry mixture. Stir in cranberries and almonds.
- On a lightly floured surface, pour out dough and cut into two equal pieces. Shape each into 8 inch long log.
- Place on baking sheets, spacing well apart. Bake logs for 12 minutes. Reverse position of
- baking sheets. bake logs until firm and dry to touch, about 12 more minutes.
- Remove from oven. Let cool on sheets for 10 minutes.
- Reduce the oven temperature to 325 degrees.
- Using a knife, cut the logs into 1/2-inch thick slices.
- Remove parchment paper from baking sheets. Return slices to baking sheets, cut side down. Bake biscotti until dry and slightly darker, about 10 minutes. Transfer to wire racks and cool completely.
- Melt dark chocolate. Using a knife, paint half of the biscotti with the chocolate, decorate as desired with M&M's or glitter.
I’ll be honest. This is a sponsored post that I took on as a challenge for a couple of reasons. One because it included biscotti and I had never made them. Secondly because the requirement that we use Dove Chocolates to dip the biscotti in was good with me. Not only do I personally love them but my daughter mentioned to me that America’s Test Kitchen has recently chosen Dove Chocolates as some of the best. They were perfect to work with. I made something last week that required melted chocolate and twice it seized on me, the first time when trying to melt it in the microwave and again in a 2nd attempt using a double boiler. The Dove Chocolates melted easily in the microwave and even as the chocolate cooled a bit, was easily warmed and melted again.
As it turns out, we weren’t required to make our own biscotti for this post and I could have just purchased some from the store. Ahem…how boring is that!!?? I put a call out to some friends for recipes and a friend on Twitter, Sarah James provided me with a recipe that sounded perfect; a chocolate biscotti with cranberries and almonds. My plan was to dip the biscotti in more chocolate and them make them kid friendly by decorating them with M&M’s. I have to tell you…M&M’s never seemed so huge until you are trying to use them to make a decoration on a biscotti! Next time? I need more landscape or much smaller M&M’s!
I hope Aaron, Skylar and Ansh’ daughter enjoys these holiday treats; I truly enjoyed making them!
Save RecipeIngredients
- Cranberry-Almond Chocolate Biscotti
- Ingredients
- 1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
- 3/4 cups sugar
- 1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
- 2 teaspoons baking soda
- 1/8 teaspoon salt
- 3 large eggs
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 1/4 cup unsalted butter, melted
- 1 cup dried cranberries
- 1 cup sliced almonds
- 8 ounces of Dove Promises Silky Smooth Dark Chocolate
- 1 Small package M&M Chocolate Candie
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees and place 1 rack in top third and 1 rack in bottom third.
- LIne 2 rimmed baking sheets with parchment paper.
- Sift together flour, sugar, cocoa powder, baking soda and salt.
- Whisk eggs and vanilla together in medium bowl. Beat egg mixture,then melted butter into dry mixture. Stir in cranberries and almonds.
- On a lightly floured surface, pour out dough and cut into two equal pieces. Shape each into 8 inch long log.
- Place on baking sheets, spacing well apart. Bake logs for 12 minutes. Reverse position of
- baking sheets. bake logs until firm and dry to touch, about 12 more minutes.
- Remove from oven. Let cool on sheets for 10 minutes.
- Reduce the oven temperature to 325 degrees.
- Using a knife, cut the logs into 1/2-inch thick slices.
- Remove parchment paper from baking sheets. Return slices to baking sheets, cut side down. Bake biscotti until dry and slightly darker, about 10 minutes. Transfer to wire racks and cool completely.
- Melt dark chocolate. Using a knife, paint half of the biscotti with the chocolate, decorate as desired with M&M's or glitter.
Click to sweeten the holidays with Silky Smooth Dove Chocolate.
Disclosure: Compensation was provided by Mars via Glam Media.
The opinions expressed herein are those of the author and are not indicative of the opinions or positions of Mars.
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