Thursday 25 April 2013

Toasted walnut and gruyère biscotti

Toasted walnut and gruyère biscotti 
BISCOTTI150g plain flour
half a teaspoon of baking powder
pepper
dash of salt (because cheese provides a lot of saltiness)
2 small/medium eggs, beaten
70g whole walnuts
70g gruyère cheese, grated
a teaspoon of worcestershire sauce

Preheat the oven to 200C, and turn a pan onto medium heat.
In the pan, toast the walnuts for about 5 minutes, but be careful not to burn them! Constantly move them.
Mix together the flour, baking powder, salt, pepper and worcestershire sauce.
Then add the eggs, mixing with the fork until you get a good dough. You don't want the mixture to be wet, so add more flour if it needs it.
Roughly chop the walnuts into smaller chunks (discarding any burnt bits), and add to the dough.
Also add the cheese to the dough and combine by hand. Or do it all by food processor. But cooking like this is healthy! It's exercise! Cans of beans for weights, whisking egg whites for toning, and kneading for stamina. It's cheaper than a gym membership too!

Toasted walnut and gruyère biscotti
Divide the dough into two and shape into rolls.
Press down on the rolls so that you have fat, flat, long rolls (approx, and I mean approx 1.5cm x 5cm x 15cm)
Put them on a baking tray lined with baking paper, and 2 minutes before you put them in the oven, turn the oven down to 180C.
Leave to cook in the oven for 20-25 minutes.
When you take the biscotti out, cut it diagonally (it looks nice) with a serrated knife.
Put these slices back into the oven on the slightly lower temperature of 170C to cook for a further fifteen minutes. You want to dry the biscotti out a bit.

Serve with a nut dip, or a soup.
I would personally serve with a fresh chunky yet smooth blend of cashews and salted/honey roasted peanuts (blitz them together in a food processor) or guacamole, or French onion soup.


Peanut dip
You could:
add diced black olives/ serve with a tapenade
use sundried tomatoes instead of walnuts
use parmigiano reggiano
make a 'quattro formaggi' biscotti with 4 different cheeses

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