Home Made by Emiliano

Emiliano’s favourite desert believe it or not is a traditional Tuscan biscuit – Cantuccini accompanied of course with a glass of Vin Santo.  He has been nagging for weeks now that he wanted to actually try to make them himself so the other night he finally got his wish and we (at 9.30pm mind you!) made our first ever batch of Cantuccini biscuits.

I prepared the ingredients and then stood on the side-lines barking orders at Emiliano.  I guess I have to admit that I’m a bit of a control freak and even though I was tempted to take-over, it was a pleasure to watch him concentrating so much on his creation.

Cantuccini are also known as Cantucci or Biscotti di Prato as this is the town where they were apparently created.  They are cooked twice, first as long logs, then they are sliced diagonally and laid flat on a baking tray in the oven for another 10 minutes or so.  I read that the word Biscotto actually means cooked twice.  Bis-twice & Cotto-cooked which actually makes sense.  Cantuccini are also traditionally eaten by dunking them in a glass of vin santo.  I like to let mine sit in the glass for a few minutes and soak up the vin santo.  I actually don’t think i even drink the vin santo from the glass, I just suck it through the cantuccini biscuits.

We found the recipe online but I’m not convinced it is the best one so we may have to taste a few more in our quest to find the best cantuccini recipe, a job that Emiliano will not complain about at all.