Almond Biscotti: How to Make Perfect Biscotti

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The perfect almond biscotti is sturdy enough to soak in your coffee (or tea) without dissolving, but not so tough it breaks your teeth. To achieve this crave-able texture, biscotti are baked twice… that’s where the name comes from!

Almond Biscotti Ingredients

First things first, let’s collect our ingredients.

• Pure cane sugar I use Morena sugar because it’s not processed with bone meal to bleach out all the molasses. The flavor is just a little more caramel-like. But at the risk of sounding like a certain delightful Contessa, regular granulated sugar is fine.
• Eggs For baking, I always use large eggs. They can be free-range, cage-free, pasture-raised, or the cheapest ones you can find. Whatever you normally buy is fine.
• Almond extract This imparts the big oomph of Almond flavor that makes our biscotti a real stand-out treat.
• Almond AND All-Purpose Flour We’re adding almond power everywhere we can. The almond flour helps to prevent the end product from being too tough. All-purpose flour provides the gluten structure to keep the almond biscotti just sturdy enough for dunking.
• Baking Powder We need a leavening agent, and baking powder provides the reaction we need with minimal acidic ingredients.
• Pink Himalayan Salt Pink salt has more than 84 trace minerals creating its signature color. Is it necessary? No, you can use table salt. I have a weird reaction to iodized salt, so I use pink in all my recipes.
• Whole Almonds We’re not playing around with sliced almonds here. Inspired by Costco’s mini almond biscotti, this recipe uses toasted whole almonds for a satisfying crunch in each bite.

Biscotti Tool Kit

• Baking Sheet I use a half-sheet, rimmed baking sheet for just about everything. It’s my old faithful.
• Parchment Paper Parchment paper is a great way to prevent baked goods from sticking to your baking sheet.
• Whisk You can use an electric mixer if you want, but a whisk will work just fine.
• Rubber Spatula There’s not a lot of liquid in this recipe, and the dough is quite firm. You’ll want a spatula to mix everything well.
• Serrated Knife Our almond biscotti needs to be sliced into the signature plank shapes after the first bake. A serrated knife is the best way to get clean cuts without too much crumbling
• Cutting Board A good cutting board protects your counters from destruction by knife.
• Wire Cooling Rack The cooling rack allows airflow on all sides of your biscotti. We don’t want a soggy bottom, and we want our biscotti to cool as quickly as possible.

Skills to Know

This is not a complicated recipe, but there are a couple of skills you’ll want to understand to make my almond biscotti.

Whisking to Ribbon Stage

The first thing we’ll do is whip our eggs and sugar until we get a thick, pale yellow mixture. In some recipes, this will be referred to as the “ribbon stage.” This is because the whisking motion breaks down the sugar molecules and lines the proteins in the egg up. You’re also adding air into the mixture so it fluffs up. The result is a paler yellow, a thicker texture, and it falls off your whisk in a continuous ribbon.

Forming the Dough

After the ribbon stage, it’s just folding in dry ingredients. That’s pretty self-explanatory. So the next step we want to examine is how to form your dough before the first bake. This dough isn’t like a cookie dough. It’s more batter-like, so you’re going to pour the batter onto the parchment-lined baking sheet.

Then using your spatula, form up the sides of your batter so you have a flat plank of dough that measures roughly 9 inches long by 6 inches wide and 1 inch tall. Try to keep the sides as squared up as possible to ensure even baking.

Slicing Your Almond Biscotti

After the first bake, you need to slice the biscotti. There are a couple of crucial things to know at this stage.

First, you need to let the biscotti cool for at least 20 minutes until room temperature before cutting. It’s less likely to crack and crumble this way. Plus you don’t risk burning your fingers.

Second, you need to use a serrated bread knife. A carving knife may lead to breakage, whereas a serrated blade will get you cleaner, even cuts.

Cut the big block in half first, and keep subdividing the pieces in half until you have 16 lovely biscotti.

Place them onto the baking sheet with a cut side up to bake for 15 minutes. Then flip them and bake for another 15 minutes. This second bake helps them dry out so they’ll last longer and soak up more coffee when you use them.

Don’t forget to subscribe to the blog for weekly updates so you don’t miss future related posts, and so you can snag your free meal planning and grocery shopping worksheet!

Comment below if you have questions, concerns, or opinions. And tag me @ellejayathome on Instagram or Twitter if you share pictures from any of my recipes. I love to hear from you!

Almond Biscotti

The perfect almond biscotti is sturdy enough to soak in your coffee (or tea) without dissolving, but not so tough it breaks your teeth.

Print Recipe Pin Recipe

Prep Time 20 minutes mins

Cook Time 50 minutes mins

Cooling Time 30 minutes mins

Course Breakfast, Dessert

Cuisine Italian

Servings 16 Biscotti

Equipment

• Baking sheet
• Parchment paper or silicone baking mat
• Large mixing bowl
• Whisk
• Rubber spatula
• Serrated Knife

Ingredients

  

• 3/4 cup pure cane sugar
• 2 large eggs
• ½ tsp almond extract
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1¼ cups all purpose flour
• 1 cup almond flour
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp Himalayan pink sea salt
• ½ tsp ground cinnamon
• ½ cup whole almonds toasted
• 4 oz white chocolate
• 1 tsp coconut oil

Instructions

 

• Preheat the oven to 350ºF. Line your baking sheet with parchment paper.
• In a large bowl, combine the sugar and eggs. Whisk until the mixture is light yellow and slightly thickened, about 4 minutes. Mix in the almond and vanilla extracts.
• Fold in flour, almond flour, baking powder, and salt. When the dough is nearly all combined, fold in the almonds.
• Form the dough into a 9 inch by 6 inch rectangle on your lined baking sheet. It should be roughly 1 inch tall. Bake for 30 minutes, until lightly golden brown.
• Cool the biscotti on the pan for 15 minutes. While cooling, reduce the oven temperature to 300ºF.
• Slice your biscotti into 16 planks. Lay them cut side down on the baking sheet. Bake for 15 minutes. Flip the biscotti over and bake on the other side for an additional 15 minutes or until dry.
• Once biscotti are golden brown, remove from baking sheet to wire cooling rack to cool completely, about 20 minutes.
• Chop the white chocolate and place it in a microwave-safe bowl with the coconut oil. Melt in 30-second intervals at regular power until starting to melt but chunks are still visible. Stir to finish melting. The residual heat from the bowl is enough to finish melting without overheating the white chocolate.
• Dip the bottoms of your biscotti in the white chocolate. Place them on a piece of parchcment paper to set. Drizzle any remaining chocolate over the sides. Allow the chocolate to set before storing away in an airtight container.
• Enjoy with your favorite cup of coffee!

Keyword Almond, Biscotti

Don’t forget to subscribe to the blog for weekly updates so you don’t miss future related posts, and so you can snag your free meal planning and grocery shopping worksheet!

Comment below if you have questions, concerns, or opinions. And tag me @ellejayathome on Instagram or Twitter if you share pictures from any of my recipes. I love to hear from you!

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