Pumpkin Biscotti

A biscotti is an Italian biscuit which is twice baked. That makes it harder than a conventional biscuit, but they are meant to be drunk with coffee.

Ingredients

1 large free range egg

1/2 cup sugar

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 cup fresh pumpkin puree

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon nutmeg

1/4 teaspoon freshly grated ginger

1/8 teaspoon ground cloves

Pinch of salt

1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

1 1/4 cups flour

4 ounces good quality white chocolate, chopped

5 tablespoons chopped toasted walnuts

Preheat the oven to 350 and line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

 Method

In a bowl, whisk the egg, sugar and baking powder, until the mixture turns pale yellow and forms ribbons when you remove the whisk. Add the pumpkin puree, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, cloves, salt and vanilla. Finally, sift in the flour and fold it in with a spatula, don’t overwork you need the air in the mixture.

Shape the dough into a flat log roughly  3″ wide by 8″. Bake for 40 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean. Remove from the oven, reduce the oven to 300 and let the biscotti rest at room temperature for 15 minutes, pop the walnuts in to toast. Slice the pumpkin biscotti into 1/2″ slices, place them back on the baking sheet and bake another 15 minutes , turn them over and bake for another 10 minutes.

Let cool completely on a wire rack. Melt the white chocolate slowly, preferably in a bowl over hot water, and dip the pumpkin biscotti in. The idea is for them to look rustic, they will never look neat, so don’t even try, the joy of these pumpkin biscotti is the taste not the visual appeal. Before the chocolate sets sprinkle on the toasted walnuts, then let the biscotti set for fifteen minutes.