Chocolate Almond Biscotti

I'll be honest, this recipe was a bit of a challenge. I've never made biscotti before! Making the dough was no trouble, though, I did forget to toast the almonds before adding them. >_< I didn't know how to toast them, and I planned to look it up online but just completely forgot. I think it didn't hurt the recipe at all though, so that's good at least. =) It was interesting shaping the dough into two loaves for the first round of baking. Yes, "first" as in there are multiple. After baking the loaves for 40-50 minutes, you let it sit 15 minutes, then cut the loaves into 3/4" slices. You lay the slices on their sides on a baking sheet and bake them for another 10 minutes, then turn them over and bake them on the other side for another 10. I wouldn't recommend using your fingers... Hahaha. It hurts. Also, the biscotti are meant to be brittle, so they're easy to break. You must be gentle when handling them. (My assistant Lucas broke some, and I teased him a lot about ruining them. xP) The chocolate coating is optional, but I love chocolate so I totally did it. Although, I had to use twice as much chocolate as called for in the recipe to coat them all.

I braved the almonds and tried some biscotti (I'm obligated, after all). It was really good! <3 I mean, if I were to make some for myself, I think I'd use either miniature chocolate chips or white chocolate chips instead of almonds since I'm allergic, but other than that, they turned out great! I'd give this recipe a 4 out of 5. ^_^ By the way, from what I know about biscotti, they're meant to be brittle and dry, because you're supposed to dunk them in your coffee. I have yet to try dunking a biscotti in coffee, but I've done it with hot chocolate. It's great. =)

Here's to another month of sweets!

Cheers!

~Jesia