It's Not Easy Being Green

The other day someone said to me, "Your shoes are green. Just like Kermit the Frog." And I replied, "Hey, it's not easy, you know."

But that person was right; my shoes are indeed green -- and a rather Kermity shade of green, at that.

You know what else is green? Pistachios.

They also make an excellent ingredient in double-chocolate biscotti. Maybe it's not so difficult being green, after all...

Here, we have 2 cups of flour and 1/2 cup of unsweetened cocoa powder.  I was struck by their pleasing yin & yang design as I poured them into the bowl.

There, now, don't you feel balanced? I whisked (Read: stirred. Still can't find my whisk.) these with a teaspoon of baking soda and 1/4 teaspoon of salt.

Meanwhile, I creamed together a relatively small amount of sugar (1 cup) and a relatively small amount of room-temperature butter (6 Tablespoons). 

 Then, I stirred in 2 eggs. The eggs were also room temperature, which helps them incorporate into the rest of the ingredients a little more easily.  Here's an action shot for you:

Whooooosh!

Then I started adding the flour-cocoa powder mixture.

 We're halfway there! Let's add the rest.

Ah, a nice, dense biscotti dough. [Every time I write "biscotti" I picture Giada De Laurentiis pronouncing it in her Italian accent: bis-COH-tee.] Now for one cup of shelled pistachios (which my sainted husband shelled with his own two hands), and our special guest star: 1/2 cup of chocolate chips. A cup of pistachios turns out to be a lot more nuts than you might imagine, especially when you buy the kind in shells and you need the kind not in shells, and it takes you an extra half hour of prep time to get them there.

Fabulous! Here's the interesting thing about biscotti: you bake them twice. The first time, they are baked in one solid piece (a log, if you will). [350 degrees for 25 minutes]

But wait! There's more. After it's cool enough to handle, you slice the log with a serrated knife and bake the pieces again, cut side down. [300 degrees for 15 or so minutes until they are crunchy].

Before baking

And after baking

As far as I can tell, biscotti are the Italian equivalent of the Eastern European / Jewish mandelbrot (which is traditionally made with almonds, of course). They're both prepared in almost the same way. And both make a great snack on the side of a cup of coffee!