Chocolate and Grapefruit Biscotti

Not to harp on about food waste, but I feel like this is my year of being resourceful. After I made the Chocolate and Grapefruit Challah from Breaking Breads, I had some leftover grapefruit confit. I decided to carry on the chocolate and grapefruit theme by creating a biscotti that featured both elements. This Chocolate and Grapefruit Biscotti was born.

As an avid tea drinker, I am always looking for accompaniments to my cup. Biscotti has always been one of those treats that make a cup of tea feel more luxurious than plain. Sometimes, when I buy coffee shop biscotti, I find it lacking in flavor and texture. One of the reasons that I chose to make this chocolate and grapefruit biscotti is because I wanted a treat that was intensely flavored and fully present. It had to be a biscotti that could be a treat in its own right.

The original recipe for this biscotti is based on Biscotti al Cioccolata e Arancia from the book Biscotti By Mona Talbott and Mirella Misenti. The recipe on The Kitchn and I found it while researching biscotti making. I loved the fact that it was untraditional. My version pushes the envelope a bit further by adding in cardamom to the dough. Cardamom is one of my favorite spices to use when baking. I find that it adds a pungent fragrance that qualifies the sweetness  in baked goods. 

The combination of the dark chocolate, sweetened grapefruit peel and cardamom means that this biscotti is not an afterthought. It is a robust addition to any teatime, especially when served with a decadent hot white chocolate.

I was conflicted about writing a recipe for making this biscotti because most of the work of creating the biscotti is not mine. So instead of giving you a recipe here, I will direct you to the article on the Kitchn site. It is important to me, as a creative person, that I always give credit to others when I reference their work. As I plan to refer to a lot of other people’s recipes in this blog, it is time I set the expectation. Instead of a recipe, I am going to give you some guidelines below for recreating my version of the biscotti.

Adjustments to Make the Chocolate and Grapefruit Biscotti.

• Add in about 1/2-1 tsp of Cardamom powder to the flour before mixing into egg mixture.
• The original recipe calls for a single bake. I bake mine twice for a more American interpretation. I first bake the dough as a log at 350F for 20 minutes. Cool it off, slice gently into batons and then bake again 300F for another 20 minutes.
• These cookies only last 3 days, at most. I bake mine in batches so that I can have fresh and crunchy biscotti.