Harvest Biscotti

Ok, so I STILL had leftover canned pureed pumpkin...seriously. I shouldn't have bought the big can, but then again I couldn't have made all these extra pumpkin treats, so here it goes.

I've been thinking of making biscotti for a long time, since I am Italian and it is a classic Italian cookie, great with coffee or tea. Biscotti is a twice baked biscuit-like cookie that is baked as a log and then cut into the sliced cookies and baked again to make them nice and crisp. I was thinking, since it's my first year hosting Thanksgiving *panic* that it might be nice to have a little treat for my guest to take home after dinner. I wanted to test these out first to make sure they are good enough for company. So here goes nothing!

Harvest Biscotti

2 1/2 cups flour
1 cup brown sugar
1 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp. ground nutmeg
3/4 cup dried raisins and cranberries (Sun-Maid has these packaged together)
Pinch of salt
2 eggs
1/2 cup pumpkin puree
1 tsp. vanilla extract


Preheat oven to 350. Sift together the flour, brown sugar, baking powder, and spices. Add the raisins and cranberries and mix to incorporate thoroughly.

In a small bowl whisk together the eggs, pumpkin and vanilla extract. Pour the pumpkin mixture into the flour mixture. Give this a rough stir to generally combine ingredients, dough will be crumbly.

Flour our hands and a clean kitchen surface and lightly knead the dough. Lightly grease a baking sheet or line it with parchment paper. Form the dough into a large log, roughly 15-20 inches by 6-7 inches. The loaves should be relatively flat. Only about 1/2 inch high. Bake for 22-30 minutes at 350, until the center is firm to the touch. (you can also form 2 smaller logs, to make bite-size biscotti, change baking time to 18-25 minutes.)

Let the biscotti logs cool for 15 minutes, then using a serrated knife, cut into 1 inch thick pieces. Turn the oven to 300 and bake the biscotti pieces for 15-20 minutes. Cool completely.

Biscotti may still be a tad moist and chewy, so if you prefer the crispier biscotti let sit uncovered overnight in a dry space. Serve and enjoy!

(recipe adapted from Simply Recipes)

I choose to do the two smaller logs to have smaller biscotti, but I think I might like to have the larger ones for my guests (my guests being my parents, in-laws, my eldest brother and my youngest brother's family.) These are pretty tasty, and I really like the soft texture of the raisins and cranberries in the crisp and crumbly biscuit cookie. I think even adding nuts for crunch and a salty taste would be great as well. These were really easy to make and I think that my guest will really enjoy them as a take-home treat!

Eat, Drink and Be Merry!!

-BellaRosa

Chocolate - Chocolate Chip Shortbread

I had one of those days where I was so bored and didn't know what to do with myself, so ya know, I decided to make cookies! I am really into shortbread at the moment and I just bought some cocoa powder, which I never have on hand, so I thought chocolate shortbread would be fun. I had some left over chocolate chips and decided to add those in as well. I got the general recipe from My Baking Addiction's Mocha Shortbread Sandwich Cookies with Nutella, which sound amazing, but I didn't have the espresso granules, so I just went with straight chocolate flavor. I only made a half batch, the recipe below makes a full batch.

Chocolate-Chocolate Chip Shortbread
(adapted from My Baking Addiction)

1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1/4 cup sugar
1 tsp. vanilla
1 3/4 cup flour
1/4 cup cocoa powder
1/4 tsp. salt
1/2 cup chocolate chips (I used milk chocolate)

In a large bowl cream together the butter, sugars and vanilla.

In a medium bowl whisk or sift together the flour, cocoa powder and salt. Gradually mix the flour mixture into the butter mixture until fully incorporated. Cover bowl and refrigerate for 1 hour.

On a lightly floured surface, roll out dough to a 1/4 inch thickness. Cut with floured 2 - 3 inch cookie cutters, or cut your own rustic shapes. Place cookies 2 inches apart on a parchment lined cookie sheet.

Bake at 300 for 15-20 minutes or until set. Remove to wire racks to cool.

I have to say, these are some great little shortbread cookies. They are not too sweet and have great chocolate flavor. They were really nice and buttery and had great texture. The chocolate chips didn't add much to the overall cookie, so you could really go with or without them.

I didn't refrigerate the dough as long as the recipe says, mostly because I was impatient and it was 8 o'clock at night. But I do feel that if I did it might have been easier to handle and maybe they wouldn't have spread as much in the oven. I wasn't expecting them to spread cause other shortbread's that I have made didn't, but I was wrong.

Chocolatey-Buttery Deliciousness

These are great little cookie with nice chocolate and buttery flavor and a nice crisp texture...I hope you try them out!

Eat, Drink and Be Merry!

-BellaRosa

Spicy-Honey Glazed Shredded Chicken Sliders

I had this recipe for Spicy-Honey Glazed Chicken from the Everyday with Rachael Ray Magazine and I have made it a few times a few different ways. But I found out they have small foccacia rolls at Blackbird, the bakery across the street from us, and the Hubsie suggested to use them for sliders when I first told him about them, so I had that idea in my head. I decided to do the Spicy-Honey Chicken with some fresh, crisp lettuce and some sweet corn to add crunch.

Spicy-Honey Glazed Shredded Chicken Sliders
(adapted from Rachael Ray find that recipe here.)

3 T Olive Oil
1 clove garlic, grated or minced
3 T honey
1 tsp. hot sauce
1/2 tsp. chili powder
Squeeze of lime juice

(Not gonna lie, these measurements are approximate. The original recipe is for 8 chicken breasts, I am usually only making 2, so I just use enough of everything to make a nice amount of glaze for 2 chicken breasts.)

Heat the olive oil in a small pan. Add the garlic and let that soften. Add the honey, hot sauce, and chili powder and stir to combine. Remove from heat and add a squeeze of lime juice and set aside.

Place your chicken in a skillet and pour enough chicken broth to just about cover the chicken breasts. I season the broth with salt, pepper, red pepper flake and garlic powder. Bring to a simmer and let simmer for 1o minutes and then flip the chicken over and simmer on the other side for about 5-8 minutes until completely cooked through. Remove from pan and let cool a bit until you can handle it. Shred the chicken into the spicy-honey glaze and toss to coat.

Split your rolls and line the bottom with a piece of lettuce and some heated up, canned corn (you could use fresh I just used some that I had leftover.) Place some shredded chicken on top and add your roll top that has been slathered with mayo.

Looks picnic perfect!

I served mine with some roasted red skinned potatoes and a pickle.

For the potatoes I just cut them into wedges and coated them in olive oil. I then spiced them up with salt, pepper and garlic powder and roasted them at 375 for about 15 minutes, tossing after 10 minutes.

These little slider sammies were delicious!!!!!! So good!!! Those foccacia rolls from Blackbird are amazing!!! They are really delicious and airy, but have a good texture to them. The chicken was great with just enough glaze so that it wasn't dripping all over the place but still had great flavor.

Hope you try this recipe out...it rocks!

Eat, Drink and Be Merry!!!

-BellaRosa