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Ingredients:
 I made this recipe up a few years ago. I went looking for biscotti recipes, but found several different techniques. So, I took a few concepts I found in a few different recipes and threw them together, and was happy with the results. Is it authentic? I don’t know. Is it tasty? You bet.
The best part is that people are so ridiculously impressed by biscotti, but I find these easier to make than traditional cookies. You don’t have to cream the butter, you don’t have to drop or shape cookies and wait for several pans to finish baking. You just make the dough with two bowls and a wooden spoon, bake the logs, let them cool, slice and bake again. They’re pretty easy and hands off, and impressive. You can also use whatever spices and filling you want: cardamom and anise seed; dried cranberry and white chocolate; pistachio and dark chocolate; orange zest, orange extract and walnuts, the sky’s the limit really.
You’ll need:
3 1/4 cups AP flour
2 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1 cup sugar
10 TB butter (that’s 1 1/4 sticks)
1/3 tsp freshly ground cardamom
1/3 tsp freshly ground nutmeg
1 tsp vanilla
3 eggs
1/2 cup Dark chocolate pieces (chips or bar, as seen here)
1/2 cup dried tart cherries
1/2 cup toasted hazelnuts (or almonds or whatever nuts you want), chopped
Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.
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Step 1:
 I used this chocolate because it’s delicious. It’s about $1.70 a bar at my local Trader Joe’s, and oh my it is soooooo good. You can use whatever you want, but I chopped this up (more on that later).
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Step 2:
 So let’s prep your hazelnuts. Pour out about a cup, and toast them in a 350 degree oven until fragrant and brown, and they start to pop.
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Step 3:
 Rub them between a clean kitchen towel until the skins come off. Then, roughly chop or crush them – I pounded mine in a mortar and pestle, but you can put them in a heavy Ziploc bag and bash them with something heavy – a meat mallet, bottom of a pan, whatever.
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Step 4:
 Roughly chop up your cherries. If they’re really dry and a little hard, like mine were, put a tiny bit of water (like a teaspoon and a half) in a small cup and microwave for about 20 seconds, then mix them up and let them sit. They should plump up a bit. This picture is bad, they’re not this dark.
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Step 5:
 Chop up your chocolate into roughly 1/4" sized chunks. I chopped them a bit finer than this but forgot to take pics.
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Step 6:
 Grate up your spices. I buy whole nutmegs and grate them on the finest grater I have. Cardamom comes in green pods that look like this.
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Step 7:
 And if you bash open the green pods, you’ll see lots of little brown seeds.
They are so fragrant, and the pre-ground stuff just doesn’t hold a candle to this. Grind up those little seeds in a mortar and pestle until you get a fine powder. I used about 3.5 pods.
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Step 8:
 Now we’re ready to make the dough. Is your baking powder still active? Have you not used it since last year? Just mix some with water and if it fizzes like crazy, it’s still active.
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Step 9:
 Now, in a medium sized bowl, mix up your flour, baking powder and salt.
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Step 10:
 Chop up your butter and put it in a large bowl (make sure the bowl is microwave safe and actually fits inside your microwave).
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Step 11:
 Microwave until melted – it helps if you nuke for 15 seconds, then take it out and swirl it around, and repeat a few more times until butter is melted. Add spices, vanilla and sugar.
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Step 12:
 Add eggs, one at a time. All eggs added:
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Step 13:
 Add in the flour mixture, about 1/4 of the mixture at a time. By the end, you’ll have a thick dough.
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Step 14:
 Mix in all your goodies, the chocolate, hazelnuts, cherries, spices, etc.
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Step 15:
 Divide into two equal-ish portions on your cookie sheet.
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Step 16:
 Pat with your hands into a long rectangular log (dough will not be sticky, so you don’t need to flour or wet your hands).
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Step 17:
 Bake for 25 minutes or until golden brown.
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Step 18:
 Let cool for about an hour, and slice diagonally. Eat the end pieces.
These are fully cooked, and if you want a softer cookie, you can eat them like this. For drier, crunchier biscotti, follow the directions below.
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Step 19:
 Flip the pieces on their side. Bake in a 325 degree oven for about another 15 minutes or until lightly crisped. Turn off the oven, crack open the door, and let cool in the oven for another 15 minutes or so.
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Step 20:
 Eat. The chocolate cherry hazelnut biscotti cookies will keep for several days in an airtight container.
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