Nutella Hazelnut Biscotti

Most of you know I love Nutella. If I was stranded on a desert island, and I had to choose only a few foods, Nutella would be one of them, that's how much I love it. I buy it in bulk at my local Sam's Club. Those little jars just don't cut it in my house. We buy the industrial sized Nutella here!

When I saw a recipe for Festive Nutella Biscotti at Susan's blog. I commented that I would probably omit the cranberries cause no one in this house would eat them and then Susan linked to another Nutella recipe here. I used Nicole's recipe and I couldn't be happier with it. I did use the drizzle recipe that Susan used though, so this is kind of a combined effort recipe.

The nice thing about biscotti is you can make it in advance and they keep wonderfully. This recipe satisfies my chocolate craving in one crunchy, very chocolaty cookie! These are supposed to be on the hard crunchy side, so don't think you over baked them...they are supposed to be dunkable. The word biscotti in Italian is the plural form of biscotto, which applies to any type of biscuit, and originates from the medieval Latin word word biscoctus, meaning "twice-baked. Hey I did my homework. These type of cookies were useful because they could be stored for long periods of time, which was particularly good during long journeys and wars way back when. Don't worry, they won't last long in this house.

Break out the hot chocolate, coffee or tea and get dunking!

Nutella Biscotti
Printable recipe
2 ¼ cups all purpose flour
2 tbsp cocoa
½ tsp baking powder
½ tsp baking soda
½ tsp salt
3 large eggs
1 cup sugar
½ cup Nutella
½ cup chocolate chips
½ cup hazelnuts (optional)

Preheat oven to 350F.

Sift together flour, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a medium bowl. Using an electric mixer, beat eggs in a large bowl until frothy. Add sugar and continue beating on high setting for 2 minutes. Beat in Nutella.

Add flour mixture to egg mixture and stir until well combined. Stir in chocolate chips and hazelnuts, if using. Divide dough into 2 or 3 logs with well floured hands and arrange on a parchment lined baking sheet. Press logs into rectangles roughly ½ inch thick. Bake at 350F for 20 minutes.

Remove logs from oven and turn the heat down to 300F. Using a serrated knife, cut logs into 1/3-1/2 inch slices. Arrange on baking sheet and return to oven. Bake for 10-12 minutes. Turn biscotti over and bake an additional 10-12 minutes (depending upon the thickness of your slices). Remove to a wire rack to cool.

Drizzle
1/4 cup Nutella
1/4 cup powdered sugar
2 tablespoons boiling water (add more if not thin enough)

When cool, in a small bowl, whisk together remaining 1/4 cup Nutella, powdered sugar and boiling water until smooth.
Drizzle glaze over cookies with fork or dip one end of each cookie into glaze. Dry at room temperature for at least 1 hour to set the glaze.

Store in an airtight container. Makes 3-4 dozen cookies.