Finally, I gave in to my wanting to bake something for Christmas. I really tried not to, but one morning I just knew. And oh, are these nice! Love my island with Christmas décor.

There’s no special baking marathon going on at my house this year. Usually, my friends Cherrie and Jackie spend a good part of a day baking all manner of Christmas cookies. But Covid has interrupted that venture. I have such a big kitchen, there is room for all three of us doing whatever needs to be done. And I have two ovens. But not happening this year. Boo-hoo. I’m not even doing Christmas cards this year. Perhaps the first year since I became an adult. My heart just isn’t in it.

But, I gave in to my cravings and decided to make biscotti. The recipe in my file says this one came from Giada. I haven’t gone searching, but it sounds logical since biscotti are an Italian invention, and she is Italian, for sure. Many eons ago I worked with a woman my age who was Italian, and every Christmas her mother made anise biscotti. Doreen would bring in part of the batch and share it with the people in the office. I had never had anise – well, other than in Italian sausage, I suppose. I have a special anise cake here on my blog – if you’re interested and didn’t catch that recipe when it appeared. It’s my variation on Mark Miller’s recipe from Coyote Café in Santa Fe, New Mexico. But back in the mid 1970s, I’d never had anise in a baked good, for sure. I was enamored, and for some years I made them myself. But I found the dough kind of hard to work with. Well, not really the dough, it was the baked log – I found it so hard to cut it without each slice crumbling apart, breaking, particularly on the ends. My DH didn’t like anise cookies much – he didn’t eat them, so I stopped making them. Then I visited my friend Linda a few years ago and she served me her Almond-Anise Biscotti. Oh, gosh, they are good! In fact Linda sent me home with a little jar with Sambuca in it – I’m so glad I remember this . . . I’ll have to make them too. Then a couple of years ago I started making chocolate biscotti, and that was when the tide turned for me about how easy biscotti can be. Farmgirl Susan’s recipe was by far the easiest dough (biscotti type) I’d ever worked with.

However, I wasn’t sure when I started making THIS recipe that the dough would cooperate. But it did. I think I broke 3 slices of the biscotti during the slicing process. DO USE A BREAD KNIFE.

The dough is mixed (I used my stand mixer, but a hand mixer would work) and at the last you add in the chocolate chips. The dough was just barely on the sticky side, so I did sprinkle my countertop with a tiny bit of flour, molded it into the shape you see at top left, then carefully transferred the log to the parchment lined baking sheet.

Into a 350° oven it went for 30 minutes. At that point it was just tinged with golden color. The tray was removed and allowed to cool for 30 minutes. Do set a timer on this – you don’t want the baked log to get cooled down completely or you’ll have trouble slicing it. Slice – remember, serrated knife – into thin slices, lay flat (mostly flat – I had to stand a few of them up on their edges because the sheet pan was full) and bake for another 15 minutes. Then cool completely. I stacked these into freezer bags and that’s where they are now.

What’s GOOD: love the flavor. The anise is subtle here – if you wanted it to be more predominant, double the amount of anise. I liked it just fine. My anise seeds are a bit aged, so I actually used about 1 1/2 tsp, ground up finely in my spice grinder. And for me, the chocolate chips put them over the top. Delicious.

What’s NOT: they’re a little bit fragile to handle – be gentle! Otherwise, they are a perfect biscotti specimen!

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A post from Sara . . .

This is my new go-to brownie recipe.  It’s a bit more challenging than the one-bowl recipes but well worth it.  They taste great out of oven (if my kids are home, I usually loose 1/4 of the tray within minutes of removing it from the oven!).  And soooo much better frozen.  They are the true dense, chewy chocolaty taste that I feel brownies should be. The recipe comes from the back of the Rodelle brand cocoa package. It’s been on the back of their product for years and years.

The recipe requires the extra step of melting the butter with sugar to make a syrup.  Then the 5 (that’s right, 5) eggs makes the chewy (and tender) factor.  You can double this recipe easily and bake it in a large sheet pan.  Don’t skip the parchment paper on the bottom for easy removal. The recipe says it makes 12, but I think I cut them smaller, so I get about 18 out of the 9×13 pan.

I’ve been known to modify the recipe by adding these items:

1. melted smooth peanut butter and swirl it in

2. or dulce de leche and swirl it in

3. or stack it on top of a batch of my chocolate chip cookies in bar form.

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A post from Sara . . .

Do you remember that childhood treat, the Whoopie Pie?  That hand-held delectably moist chocolate cake with marshmallow buttercream inside?  I recently made this recipe again. I can’t remember when I made it last but whoa, was it good! My kids and their friends who are now in their 20’s ate them within 2 days and I made a double batch! I’ve already been asked to make more. They are an excellent make ahead individual dessert that travels well and freezes easily.

My suggestions while making the cakes:

• Use a scoop so that the cakes are close in size and shape.  That way they can be matched up easily to make the sandwich-style “pie.”
• Keep the cake batter chilled, as it tends to spread out if it gets too warm.
• When assembling the pies I paired the cakes on a cooling rack. Then flip every other row onto its top to expose the flat bottom of the cake for frosting.
• Use a smaller scoop to add frosting.  It spreads out on its own, no need to use a knife.  I topped each upside down frosted cake with another so that both cake tops were showing.
• If it’s warm, the top cake will slide.  So once assembled,  immediately refrigerate to solidify the frosting.

Due to COVID, I chose to wrap each pie individually in plastic wrap so the kids could just grab and enjoy.  

The recipe makes 8 pies but they are quite large.  I think using a smaller scoop and making twice as many would be better next time. There is a Wilton 12-Cavity Whoopie Pie Baking Pan available on amazon, but those are the larger (standard) size. If  you decide to make them smaller, just use a cookie sheet. These dessert cookies are very rich and full of flavor so I believe the smaller size is a better choice.

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Yes, chocolate chip, but with a decidedly different texture and flavor profile.

Necessity is the mother of invention. During the time when I was eschewing nearly all carbs, I had collected a lot of recipes, including this one for a GF cookie (although this one I made here is not quite GF). I was all out of my last batch of choc chip cookies, so needed to find something new to try. I wanted to make something that had next to no sugar, and very little if any flour. This recipe came into being. I had almond butter on hand. In little 1 ounce packages. Hmm. But not enough to make 6 tablespoons. But I did have peanut butter, so I combined the two. Neither flavor really prevailed in the finished cookie, which was fine with me. The recipe called for coconut butter (oil), but I used unsalted butter. It also called for coconut sugar. I had some, but decided to use some monkfruit sweetener in addition, so I did half and half. I had the pure blanched almond flour on hand, but I also had some of Trader Joe’s almond meal (which contains some of the almond skin – hence these cookies have a little more dark/speckled look to them. The recipe also called for coconut flour, so that’s when I substituted regular wheat flour, all purpose. It was only 1/3 cup, so hardly any carbs for the whole recipe.

I’ve renamed the recipe because these cookies have a different texture – not exactly like pecan sandies – but they’re similar in texture. So even though they’re chocolate chip, with a hint of peanut butter, they do have a different texture than any chocolate chip cookie I’ve ever made.

Mixing it up was no trouble – into my stand mixer went the ingredients in a specific order. Refrigerated butter needs nothing more than 10 seconds in my microwave to be softened. No more, no less.

Knowing that I’d veered away from the original recipe with a lot of different ingredients, I wasn’t sure how they would turn out during the baking process, so I baked just two at first, thinking that I could add more flour or something else if it needed it. Once out of the oven they were incredibly soft and tender. They looked done, but when I touched the top of the cookie, it was almost a wet pouf, but once I let them cool  on the sheet first, they were easy to remove from the cookie sheet. And they were fine. Just fine. Better than fine!Next time I’ll add some chopped walnuts, just because I like choc chip cookies with nuts. So you could easily add 1/3 cup of them to this recipe, or not; your choice. You’ll get a yield of a couple more cookies.

What’s GOOD: definitely chocolate chip. Definitely different texture (but good). Like them a lot. I wouldn’t change a thing.

What’s NOT: only if you don’t have almond flour, or almond butter. Easy to make. Can be refrigerated before baking.

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This recipe was a winner of some kind of contest. A good reason to try them.

Whenever I input a recipe into my MasterCook software, and it has some kind of special accolades, I usually write it into the title so I can see it easily when I’m scanning through the list of recipes to try. In this case I wrote after cookies – “Sunset winner.” It’s been a few years ago, I think, but this cookie did win something. It might have been for Christmas cookies? I don’t recall. They contain an inordinate amount of crystallized ginger – plus ground ginger – so yes, these really have a ginger pungency. Not overwhelming by any means. I used every bit of crystallized ginger I could find in my pantry, and I’m not even sure I had quite enough. But it was close enough.

The making of the cookies was exceedingly easy – it got mixed up in the food processor – not my normal bowl of choice for making cookies and I will say, I had to remove half of it (I made a double batch) in order for the food processor to mix it sufficiently. Then remove that to do the second half. Then the dough was refrigerated – for me it was overnight. It would be best if you chilled it overnight if you took it out for about 30-45 minutes before trying to roll them in sugar. If the dough is cold, it’s harder to do that part.

I used my cookie scoop, but with that, I made them smaller than the scoop. I think the double recipe was supposed to make 72. Uhm, no, it didn’t. It made more like 48, but perhaps I made them much bigger. They were supposed to be 1-inch balls. I’m sure mine were a tad bigger than that. I have offered to bake cookies for a memorial service reception – as I write this, it was supposed to take place tomorrow, but with the Covad-19 overwhelming our country, the service has been indefinitely postponed. But I made them now and will just store in the freezer until they’re needed.

The only alteration I would make – and I did make in the recipe attached – was to reduce the amount of sugar. I thought the cookies were overly sweet. So, if you make these, taste the dough (note: the dough has raw egg in it) to see if you think it’s sweet enough with the reduced sugar amount. The original recipe called for 1/3 cup sugar to mix with the ginger, and 1/3 cup sugar mixed with the dough. You could also use 1/4 cup rounded on each measurement. I’ve not included this information in the pdf recipe attached. The difference could be the amount of sugar used in the crystallized ginger. Every product could be different.

What’s GOOD: lots of gingery flavor, crisp. Chewy. Love the craggy, crackled tops. Very sweet. I changed the amount of sugar in the attached recipe – read the above paragraph for more information.

What’s NOT: nary a thing that I can think of, unless you don’t like ginger!

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Are you really tired of reading another chocolate chip cookie recipe from me? My apologies, but I guess I’ll be forever on the quest for the perfect one.

I’m assuming most of you are on house arrest, aka shelter-in-place like I am. Social Distancing. What a phrase – we’ll remember that word forever, won’t we? As I write this, I’m on day 17 of being at home all day, all night, with not a single trip out of my driveway. In many ways, I’m lucky – I live in a big house, and I use most of the rooms  – living room for my phone calls on my cell – dining room table for a project now and then – kitchen all the time because I’m cooking a lot more than usual – my kitchen dining table is where I eat most of my meals – and my family room with TV (on from about 8am to 8 pm every day) and the gas fireplace nearby. Master bedroom of course, my big bath and dressing room area gets daily use, and my very comfortable library/study up there where I watch TV in the  evenings.

My report? I’m fine – feeling fine, no symptoms. My next door neighbor, Josee, has been a lifesaver for me – she goes shopping for me about once a week or every other week. The high school kids at my church are also available for shopping – all I have to do is send a list, put out some cash and shopping bags and they bring it back an hour later. I stay busy enough, I guess. I do watch the TV more than usual – tuned into news most of the hours, then in the late evening I go upstairs to my comfy study and start watching some of my recorded shows that take my mind off coronavirus. Have you seen this picture?

That’s my neighbor’s very well-trained standard Doberman. I was sent a similar picture of a little Chihuahua with similar wording but had an acronym on the photo that wasn’t nice language – I sent it to my neighbor and she took a picture of Batman and added the same lingo but with the word “heck” instead of the f word.

Anyway, I belly-laughed so hard over this picture. Laughing is good for us, you know?

In my normal life I’m so busy I rarely have enough time to read or go up to my studio (an unused room in my house at the moment) to draw or paint. Reading I’m doing (see sidebar on my web page for what I’ve read recently). Cooking, I’m doing. But most everything else has fallen by the wayside. Have I cleaned my house? Nope. I’ve paid the two women who come clean my house for me, but I told them not to come in. I’ll do that again next week when they’d be due to come again. And I’ll pay them anyway as I know they need the money. I can’t seem to concentrate on doing other things. A couple of days earlier this week we had really beautiful weather here in Orange County and I went outside and sat in my nice outdoor furniture, under the umbrella and read for awhile, always conscious of the fresh air, the birds singing and the butterflies flitting.

What I crave is comfort food. What I really want is a pasta casserole (haven’t made one). Or things like mashed potatoes (haven’t done that either). Soup has been a mainstay on my table and you’ll have another recipe up soon – a delicious creamy chicken poblano chile from Joanna Gaines. Delicious. Most nights I have a big green salad. My neighbor is bringing me fresh salmon today from her shopping run, so I’ll have that with some fresh asparagus tonight.

Comfort food: [from wikipedia] The term comfort food has been traced back at least to 1966, when the Palm Beach Post used it in a story: “Adults, when under severe emotional stress, turn to what could be called ‘comfort food’—food associated with the security of childhood, like mother’s poached egg or famous chicken soup.”

I can’t say that I turn my mind to poached eggs. Or chicken soup either as my mother didn’t make chicken soup (my dad wouldn’t eat chicken). It might be better for me if I indulged in pasta or potatoes – rather than chocolate chip cookies! I don’t know about you, but I have a favorite brand of chocolate chips. I grew up on Nestlé’s semisweet, but oh no, since the advent of dark chocolate chips, I’m all over those, and Ghiradelli Bittersweet are my favorite. They’re very hard to find these days – have you noticed? I even considered ordering a 25 pound bag from amazon, but it was semisweet and I want bittersweet. So I’m figuring that lots of other households are baking chocolate chip cookies just like I am. My neighbor took a photo of the shelf at the grocery store – empty of Ghiradelli’s bittersweet. Sigh. So, since I’m nearly out of them in my own pantry, I dug into my chocolate stash and found a bag of Callibaut very bitter chocolate chips. They’re fine – I like them. So I’ll certainly have a couple more recipes’ worth before I’m desperate for Ghiradelli. Now that I’ve alerted my neighbor to look for them, she’ll probably hunt for them whenever she’s shopping.

Turning to a cookbook I’ve had for awhile (I think I bought it just before Dave passed away) I found several cc cookie recipes that would suffice, but this one, Alice Medrich’s favorite, seemed to leap off the page. When I began I didn’t realize how different the batter/dough would be. This recipe uses melted butter  – certainly a variant that was not something I’ve ever done for cc cookies. The butter is combined with the regular and brown sugars, eggs, then the dry ingredients. The dough has a totally different look – it’s wet. See photo. I’m not sure you can tell from the photo  – it really does LOOK wet, although the dough is handle-able and pliable. It’s not sticky in the least.

The only other variant was that it recommended at least an hour or two of chilling (even overnight if time permitted). I did an hour. Then used my scoop for 1-tablespoon sized mounds. My baking sheets don’t require foil or parchment – they baked up perfectly.

What’s GOOD: gee, I really like these cc cookies. I want to try them with Ghiradelli, but other than that, they’re a perfect complement to a hot cup of coffee or tea. Or a mid-afternoon snack.

What’s NOT: nothing really. My problem is that I know they’re in the freezer . . . .

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One might think these aren’t mixed or baked correctly. They are, actually. They’re supposed to look like that, and act like that when these hit the hot oven.

Really, I think I was pussy-footing around about cookies – when I made and posted the chocolate log/biscotti last week. What I really wanted to make was choc chip cookies, but I was trying to convince myself not to. Since they’re not all that good for us – butter, chocolate, sugar, etc. And my problem is that if they’re available – meaning they’re IN my freezer – I want to enjoy one every day. And I shouldn’t. None of us should. But then, David Lebovitz posted a new chocolate chip recipe, and I got sucked down that vortex of I want – I want – I want. So I gave in and made these.

The recipe originated with Joanne Chang, a chef/baker of renown (her bakery, Flour, in Boston). She’s written a bunch of cookbooks. She’s slender/thin (how does she DO that and own/run a bakery and develop recipes?). Anyway, I think this recipe came from her most recently published cookbook. David Lebovitz adapted it slightly (reducing the amount of flour in it) and posted it on his website.

What’s different about these? You have to use superfine sugar (I whizzed up regular sugar in the food processor). You have to whip up the butter and sugars until they’re really light and fluffy. It gives these cookies a totally different batter-feel. And when they pop in the oven they spread a lot. So the baking sheet can only hold six to seven of them at a time. But then, this recipe only makes 25 cookies. The cookies that David Lebovitz made were even thinner than mine – and even more slumped than mine – slumped with little whorls of ridges. There’s another recipe here on my blog that has very thin, slumped chocolate chip cookies and I don’t really understand how the chemistry works that way – it can’t be just the lesser amount of flour.

But thin, chocolate chip cookies it is and I loved them. Hard to make? – no. Much the same ingredients as every other chocolate chip cookie out there with a mix of white and brown sugar, vanilla, egg, flour, in this case, baking soda not powder, and chocolate chips and little bit of water. There are nuances of that chemistry – far be it from me to understand it. For the last half of the cookies I added some very finely chopped walnuts. I know, blasphemy for some. I like them with nuts in them. This recipe has less flour in it than Joanne Chang’s original recipe, per David L.

These will be going into the freezer and I’ll hope to eat only one. A day. And savor every bite.

What’s GOOD: the thin, crispy texture, for sure. That’s what these cookies are all about. If you like soft, cakey cookies, skip by this recipe. Thin, chewy a little bit, all about the mouth-feel of the caramelization of the dark brown sugar. And then the chips. Use good chips, not Nestle’s. They recommended Guittard. I used Ghirardelli dark chocolate. In sum, though, I think I like my other iteration of these thin, slumped cookies better that did slump and have whorls. These cookies definitely have dark brown sugar caramelization going on in the cookie itself, just so you know.

What’s NOT: nothing at all. These are really delicious.

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Chocolate cookies. Yes. But not exactly. Hard to describe. Maybe Biscotti is a better name.

Laughing at myself. I’ve finally gone off this restrictive diet and after having a couple of old dinner favorites (already posted here) I settled back into a fairly low-carb regime with an occasional sweet or treat. I was craving a cookie, and after going through my huge to-try file, I settled on these things. It’s a recipe that’s been in the file for years, I believe. These cookies – not exactly biscotti, because they’re not double baked liked biscotti, or cookies either, because they’re sliced on the diagonal (kind of like biscotti would be) are different. Kind of hard to describe, as I said above. You could call them chocolate rocks. Or biscotti. Or chocolate sliced cookies. Any name would work.

The dough contains no butter or traditional fat – the only fat comes from the nearly one pound of chocolate in the batter. That’s enough, although I’ll tell you, the dough is not very easy to man-handle. It’s a very dry dough (eggs, espresso, cocoa, vanilla, leavening, flour, sugar, fresh orange zest, and a hefty amount of cinnamon and ground cloves). At the end you add in some nuts (hazelnuts and/or almonds). I ended up removing half the dough and just mixing half at a time. Overworking the dough would make for a very tough cookie. The dough – almost the consistency of firm bread dough  – is sectioned into 4 pieces, then rolled into short logs. Because of the chocolate pieces in it and the nuts, it makes for some difficult handling, I’ll tell you. The rolls don’t want to roll very well. Or as you roll one, a drier spot appears (more nuts, for instance) and then the roll falls apart. I ended up adding a bit more espresso to the mixture to help hold it all together. The original recipe, from Susan Herrmann Loomis is called Almond Cocoa Cookies. Maybe they came from one of her cookbooks as I don’t find the recipe on her website.

You can see from the above picture – the rolled  up log at the top and then the cut (raw) cookie dough below. Onto a cookie sheet they went (mine are ridged, so nothing sticks) although the recipe suggested parchment be used.

They’re baked at 375°F for somewhere between 15-20 minutes. Susan indicated at 15 minutes they’re still quite soft and cakey, and with 5 more minutes baking they’re then firm. I baked mine for 17 minutes and they were firm enough, although my oven runs a bit hot so that may be why. They cooled easily enough and Susan says they keep for a couple of weeks at room temp. I’ll be freezing mine, just because I always do. But as firm as they are, I may truly want to defrost them before eating. Don’t want to break a tooth.

MY CHANGES: I reduced the amount of ground cloves and that was a good thing. Clove flavor goes a loooong way, in my book. She used a full tablespoon. I also didn’t get as many cookies as Susan did. I may have added a little bit more espresso to the mixture just to get it to hold together. I also used half sugar and half Swerve, and used 1 3/4 cups total, not 2 cups. It made for a slightly less-sweet cookie. I also didn’t have vanilla sugar – I just added in a slightly large quantity of liquid vanilla. The original recipe called for 8 ounces of almonds AND 8 ounces of hazelnuts. There is simply no way the dough could absorb that much nuts. I didn’t have hazelnuts on hand so just added almonds and only about 5 ounces.

What’s GOOD: well, they’re different. Different texture (firm to the tooth) and flavor (lots of ground clove flavor comes through). Yes, chocolate too. Although there is all that bar chocolate in it, these don’t taste decadent. I think, overall, I prefer the easy chocolate biscotti recipe I have here on my blog already, but then it’s truly a biscotti (easy one, though). Later note: I enjoyed one of these with my morning coffee and have decided they really are more like biscotti. They’re not hard crunchy (break your tooth kind of crunchy), but more like a firm but dry cookie. The coffee flavor came through and the ground clove flavor has tamed down a bit. Do note the low calorie and fat – even with a pound of chocolate, I’m pleased at the statistics.

What’s NOT: only the difficulty rolling the logs. The dry parts of the cookies (the nuts, chopped chocolate and the dry ingredients in general) make it hard to combine. Cutting them into their log shapes was okay – if you have any larger pieces of chocolate in them, it may make for difficult slicing. Other than that, nothing is hard to do. They’d be good dunked in coffee which is probably what I’ll do tomorrow morning.

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Soft, flavorful lemony cookies. With a lemon glaze.

At Phillis Carey’s cooking classes, she always serves some kind of dessert. Even if dessert isn’t the focus of the class. At this particular class she made these cookies. Sorry to say, I didn’t eat them, but my friend Cherrie did, and pronounced them delicious. Kind of like cake, she said, but not. She mentioned the lemon flavor in the glaze added a lot. These cookies aren’t overly sweet, just so you know.

Oh, and I mentioned having eaten a cheesecake made in the instant pot? Here’s the link to it. I’m not going to write up a post about it because I haven’t made any cheesecake in the IP yet. The Bloomingdale’s chef had found the recipe online:

Instant-Pot Oreo Cheesecake from My Baking Addiction (blog).

The cookie recipe came from Giada, by the way.

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Decadent tasting, full of chocolate, chocolate chips and chopped almonds. AND gluten free.

Last week I had a new friend come to visit for a few hours. She’s a Type 1 diabetic (like my DH was) and she does her best to avoid carbs. I introduced her to chaffles (you can google it – it’s quite a phenom in the low carb world). My chaffle is not really one made with cheese (that what the ch means in the name, the affle means it’s made in a little Sur La Table Dash Mini Waffle Maker waffle iron which makes one waffle round). Mine was made of egg and a tetch of almond flour, a tablespoon of mayo, baking powder and water. I doubt many of you would be interested in any of this, but they make a great substitute for bread. Put two together and you have a sandwich. If you’re interested in the recipe, click that link.

Anyway, when I pulled out my bag of Costco’s Kirkland almond flour to demonstrate how easy it is to make a sandwich chaffle, my friend Vicki asked if I’d tried the almond brownie recipe on the back of the bag. Nope, had not. But it got my taste buds hankering for brownies.

Daughter Sara and her husband were here this weekend so I had a reason to make these brownies. I did use Hershey’s cocoa powder extra dark – so the resulting brownies were really dark/black. Regular cocoa powder might not make them so dark colored. Me? I’m all into the intense flavor. But, if I’d made them for myself, I’d have eaten them all – myself. Not good. Even though they’re GF, and not too high in fat, they’re still calories. As I’m writing this, there are just 4 left. Maybe I’ll freeze them so I can dole them out to myself slowly. We’ll see how THAT goes! I cut them into small squares – I think I got more than 16 out of the 8×8 pan. But you can cut them any size you want.

Because I loved them. And I know my cousin Gary, who loves carbs and chocolate, but is GF, will love these too. He’s not much of a baker, so I’ll make a batch for him when he comes to visit next month. I mixed these up in a bowl with my hand mixer and they baked for about 30+ minutes. Once cooled, these were still quite wet/sticky, but by this morning they were perfect for picking up in hand and didn’t fall apart. I forgot to put more almonds on top. Made no never-mind in the end. These are delicious. I did use some sugar (not supposed to have any sugar, but I used half and half with artificial sugar). I think next time I’ll use a little less sugar and Swerve – I think they’re quite sweet.

What’s GOOD: the intense chocolate flavor. Love that I can have a brownie recipe that satisfies my desire for something brownie-like. The longer I’m on a no-flour diet, I realize how much white flour is used in everyday cooking, and how incredibly versatile it is. AND how important it is to making baked goods have the texture they do. Can’t get that with any of the substitute flours out there. Anyway, I loved these and will most definitely be making them again.

What’s NOT: nothing really – you do need almond flour. Trader Joe’s brand does have the skins in with the flour in their bag (which I can’t have on this diet – lectins live in the skins of almonds, amongst hundreds of other places in various foods). Kirkland’s is ground up blanched almonds. That’s what I buy now and keep it in the freezer to store it so it stays fresher, longer. What these don’t have if a ton of chewiness – they’re quite tender and soft. You won’t get chew from almond flour, I guess.

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