Chocolate Revisited

A number of years ago I aquired a book called Chocolate and The Art of Low-Fat Desserts by Alice Medrich. It was published in 1994 and the low fat craze was pretty rampant. However, this book doesn't have crazy, icky fat replacements in it. It uses a lot of egg whites (which we all know I LOVE!), and the few recipes I go back to over and over are terrific. I decided it was time to revisit this book. The pages are chocolate stained, the post-its are hanging out around the edges. My parents are coming, and my mom needs (strong word here, but it is true) a cookie fix every once in awhile. This woman can nibble a single biscotti for about 4 days, she is very mouse-like in her eating habits. So the first batch of biscotti I made from Cooking Light (an old recipe as well) disappeared pretty quick. Since my parents get here tomorrow, I decided I better bake again and get these in the freezer. No one ever looks there. And chocolate seemed appropriate with the Valentine's holiday looming. I chopped my pistachios because I have a teenage daughter who would not like the look of green nuts in her chocolate biscotti. Seriously. When she tasted these, she declared them absolutely delicious, it would not be so if those green pistachios were staring her down! Chocolate Biscotti
⅔ cup whole almonds or hazelnuts (I used pistachios)
1 ¾ cup flour (I used whole wheat)
⅓ cup cocoa (I used Pernigotti)
1 teaspoon baking soda
¼ teaspoon salt (I omitted since my pistachios were salted)
1 Tablespoon Espresso Powder
⅓ cup semi sweet morsels (get a good brand, I am using Guittard)
2 eggs
2 egg whites
1 cup sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
½ teaspoon almond extract, optional (I opted out) Preheat to 350 °. Toast the nuts briefly in the oven. Cool completely and chop. Reduce oven to 300° and line baking sheet with parchment. Whisk flour, cocoa, baking soda, salt and espresso powder in a bowl. In food processor, chop the chocolate with about a quarter of the flour mixture until crumb-like. I toss the rest of the flour mixture in the processor and use the bowl for the eggs.
Beat the eggs and egg whites with the sugar, vanilla and almond if using. Mixture will be thick and sticky. Pour in flour mixture in processor and pulse to mix. Toss in the cooled nuts, mix quick.

Shape into 3 skinny logs about 12" long and bake for 45 minutes. They will spread. Cool the loaves for about 15 minutes and remove from pan. Slice them with a bread knife and return to pan and bake again for 20-25 minutes until crispy. Flip over halfway through. Cool and store airtight.

Now, if you have shoddy dental work, be careful. The egg whites make these cookies pretty hard. But biscotti are shaped long for a reason...to dunk. The Itlaians prefer Vin Santo, but since we tend to eat these around the clock, I stick to coffee, tea and milk. They are wonderful and satisfy a chocolate craving for sure. Her stats say 47 calories per cookie in a batch of 50-60.
Stay tuned for the low fat chocolate souffles....they were delish!