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Crispy, crunchy, and perfect for dipping into a hot or cold beverage, biscotti are simple to make. I promise. All the books from my cookbook collection agree. Biscotti, from the Latin word “biscoctum” (which sounds more like a Harry Potter spell than a food item) is a twice-baked cookie.
Traditionally, biscotti are less sugary than a typical American cookie and have a firm, solid texture. These aren’t soft cookies (not like those soft brownie cookies with toffee bits).
We’ll examine the origin of biscotti and who invented biscotti, learn about dunking biscotti, and check out the different between cantucci and biscotti. Then, we’ll dive into what you need to bake biscotti at home — look for related recipes at the end of this article to learn more about baking biscotti.
Table of Contents
- What Is Biscotti Anyway?
- Who Invented Biscotti?
- The History of Biscotti Cookies
- What was the Paris Universal Exposition of 1867?
- Biscotti: The Cookie of the 1990s
- Is Biscotti Supposed to Be Hard?
- What Is Biscotti Made Of?
- What Makes a Good Biscotti?
- Are All Biscotti Made with Oil?
- What Kinds of Biscotti Are There?
- What Do You Need to Bake Biscotti?
- Are You Supposed to Dunk Biscotti in a Beverage? Which One?
- Cantucci Vs Biscotti
- The Joy of Biscotti
- Related Recipes and Resources
- Related Resources
What Is Biscotti Anyway?
Biscotti (pronounced: biss-cot-e) are a hard, Italian cookie.
The term biscuit is an ambiguous one.
It comes from the French for “twice-cooked,” and originally referred to breads and pastries that were baked until dry and hard.
Harold McGee, On Food and Cooking: The Science and Lore of the Kitchen (2004), Page 549.
The Italian hard cookies called biscotti remain true to this heritage; they’re lean doughs leavened with baking powder, baked in flattish loaves, then cut crosswise into thin pieces and rebaked at a low oven temperature to dry them out.
If you were snatching up just one of these cookies you’d use the term “biscotto.” But who ever eats just one? Answer: no one.
The first time I was served cookies for breakfast in an Italian house, I assumed the family had run out of bread and the cookies were the best substitute they could come up with in a hurry.
Carol Field, The Italian Baker (1985), Page 388.
The second time, I realized that Italians actually ate cookies for breakfast.
In fact, Italians like cookies so much that they eat them fora mid-morning snack with cappuccino or caffe latte, as a little treat with cheese at the end of the midday meal, with abandon at teatime, and at the end of a meal dunked into wine or the local Vin Santo.
Caffe latte? What is a caffe latte?
Italians are passionate about their coffee, which was made popular in Europe by the Arabs in the seventeenth century.
Espresso was invented in Italy in the early twentieth century so many cups of coffee could be brewed quickly in order to meet growing demands.
Mary Ann Esposito, Nella Cucina: More Italian Cooking from the Host of Ciao Italia (1993), Page 272.
Espresso is a method of brewing coffee in which steam is forced through ground coffee beans, which results in a thick, strong drink made palatable with sugar. With the addition of hot steamed milk and grated chocolate, it becomes cappuccino.
There are also many other inventive ways to have this brew.
Caffe latte, usually served for breakfast, is made with equal amounts of hot coffee and hot milk. Espresso macchiato has just a bit of milk, and espresso con panna is coffee with a collop of whipped cream.
Caffe Americano is just what its name implies. Espresso with a shot of whiskey, grappa, or Anisette was served by my grandmother at home. It had the ability to get you through anything.
Although biscotti might have seemed like a new food trend that took hold a few decades ago here in the U.S., it goes way back. Way, way back. Prato, a village in the Tuscan region of Italy, lays claim to creating a delicious recipe that spurred biscotti’s popularity.
Who Invented Biscotti?
Some foods have a clear beginning (such as when chocolate brownies were invented). Different places had their own versions of biscotti. But. There is someone I think we can credit with spreading their influence and keeping their popularity: Antonio Mattei.
Antonio Mattei set up his bakery in Prato in via Ricasoli (via Ricasoli being the name of the street). Biscotti di Prato mere steps away from the town hall. At the time, bread was his specialty. The bakery supplied bread, long known as the “Prato loaf” to area schools, hospitals, and local shops.
That’s not all Mattei’s bakery was known for, as the busy bakery also made pasta and biscotti. That biscotti would become its claim to fame.
Artusi, a friend of Antonio’s, asked him to open a Florence location.
Hold the phone.
Shut the front door.
All the memes.
The name, Artusi, was so casually dropped, one would think it kind of funny that Antonio’s friend’s name were still remembered. Unless, of course, Artusi happened to be a Very Important Person in History.
Spoiler alert: he was.
The History of Biscotti Cookies
I knew there was a reason for the name drop. Artusi, as in Pellegrino Marcello Artusi, whose name accompanies such terms as “pioneer of Italian gastronomy,” was a wealthy businessperson who happened to love dabbling with cooking.
Artusi and Mattei were around before Italy was, well, Italy. For the full story, you’ll want to hop over to the massive feature about Pellegrino Artusi. Here’s the condensed version.
Pellegrino Artusi was 71 when he finished his book, “The Science of Cooking and the Art of Eating Well,” with the help of his cook and an assistant. Containing hundreds of recipes, and his own commentary, he was the first Italian to publish a cookbook.
Publisher after publisher turned him down. But, lucky for Artusi, he was a wealthy man, and paid for his first printing — and then some.
First published in 1891, Pellegrino Artusi’s La scienza in cucina e l’arte di mangier bene has come to be recognized as the most significant Italian cookbook of modern times.
It was reprinted thirteen times and had sold more than 52,000 copies in the years before Artusi’s death in 1910, with the number of recipes growing from 475 to 790.And while this figure has not changed, the book has consistently remained in print.
Science in the Kitchen and the Art of Eating Well (2003).
This man had clout. He not only had money, but he was a gentleman, too. I imagine that made a difference in people’s perception of him.
Still nowadays, you can find this recipe book in almost every Italian kitchen and it is very common to hear someone while preparing a dish asking to [sic] his helper “look what Artusi says”.
Marcello & Raffaella Tori, Pellegrino Artusi – The Pioneer of Italian Gastronomy, Slow Travel Tours, April 5, 2020.
Back to the bakery. It was doing so well, the owner took Pellegrino Artusi’s request to heart. Antonio Mattei opened a second location in Florence.
Biscotti di Prato is a true local specialty. The first and most popular producer in Prato was Antonio Mattei.
Pellegrino Artusi talked about him as a “genius in his art, honest industrious man.”
A Visit to the Historic “Biscotti” Factory of Prato, Visit Tuscany, Accessed August 15, 2022.
He set up his business “Biscottificio Mattei” in Prato in via Ricasoli in 1858, making and selling the almond-flavoured Biscotti di Prato. He showed a sample of his product at the Universal Exhibition in Paris in 1867, where he won a special mention.
The shop is still there and the recipe hasn’t changed since then.
Not bad for a food item once used to keep sailors from starvation. Fortunately, we’ve changed the recipe for twice-baked cookies quite a bit since then. Those sailors wouldn’t even recognize it.
What was the Paris Universal Exposition of 1867?
The World’s Fair was a big deal (remember Chicago and the history of brownies?). The Paris Universal Expo opened April 1, 1867, and closed November 3, 1867. Forty-one countries participated with more than 50,000 exhibits.
The Champs de Mars is an hundred and fifty acres in extent, and in the centre of this the Palace of the Exposition will be erected in the form of a broad ellipse, surrounded by a garden, and having a garden within its own circumference.
The French Universal Exposition for 1867, The New York Times, Nov. 12, 1865.
“The garden will be traversed by circular avenues, running parallel with the walls; and the passages will be crossed by passages radiating from the centre of the building. The apportionment of ground to nationalities will run in belts from the radii, from the centre to the circumference.”
The French Government in undertaking this exposition contemplates the expenditure of twenty millions of francs, and there is every reason to believe that it will be the most successful, as it will certainly be the most expensive and ambitious of all the world’s fairs yet planned.
It will not only embrace the useful and attractive features of previous exhibitions, but will present a remarkable novelty of its own, in the groups of houses by which the main building will be surrounded, for the purpose of representing the architecture and domestic characteristics of different nations.
The Exposition was an incredible achievement.
The exhibits were displayed in a large central building, 32 acres in size, and nearly 100 smaller buildings. They were organized both by country and category.
The International Exposition of 1867 in Paris, Smithsonian: National Museum of American History, Accessed February 22, 2024.
The 50,226 exhibitors included 15,055 from France and its colonies, 6,176 from Great Britain and Ireland, and 703 from the United States.
They spanned a diverse range of arts and industries, including jewelry, porcelain, furniture, precious metals, carpets, carriages, clocks, watches, textiles, tools, steel, steam engines, electric motors, scientific instruments, machinery, weaponry, etc. — with an emphasis on highlighting the progress of the age.
Among the prominent new inventions shown were hydraulic elevators and reinforced concrete.
The Exposition awarded nearly 17,000 medals, certificates, and other prizes. Special citations were awarded to inventors or developers of the transatlantic cable, the telegraph, the railroad, the sewing machine, and agricultural machinery, among others.
Fewer than 2% of the exhibitors received the prestigious gold medals.
But the bakery received a special mention. Consider that for a moment. Out of all the things at this giant event, this man’s biscotti recipe earned a special mention.
Antonio passed the bakery to his son, Emilio. But, Emilio didn’t have any children. Lacking heirs, he sold the bakeries to the Pandolfini family.
If you pause for a moment at street number 76 … just take a step or two forward and peek inside, you will find a beautiful blue color to welcome you. The blue of those packages arranged in a row on the shelves, still tied by hand with a blue thread, is a tribute to unified Italy and to the blue of the House of Savoy.
Antonio Mattei: Premiata Fabrica Di Biscotti, Accessed August 21, 2021.
And if you are curious people, you can ask what is in those bags, which you won’t know the contents of, unless someone has already told you about that historical biscuit factory that has been baking its biscuits and packing them every day for more than a century and a half in that particular blue bag.
And if you are lucky you will be given a Prato almond biscuit to be enjoyed with an excellent coffee.
Because this is what it is about, an almond biscuit created in the mid-1800s by Antonio Mattei.
While the factory has modernized over the years, the original wood-burning oven and the shop sign (restored), still stand. How fun would it be to visit this bakery? What a wonderful bit of history.
Biscotti: The Cookie of the 1990s
The 1990s boasted an assortment of exciting, interesting, or bizarre foods and food news. The neon-filled decade introduced plenty of new foods to the American public and changes to the food scene. These included the following:
- Ruth Reichl becomes the restaurant critic for The New York Times — and puts a focus on the mom and pop restaurants of New York. She’s the woman behind my favorite Breakfast Cobbler recipe.
- Epicurious (1995), Chowhound (1997), and AllRecipes (1997) launched.
- Honeycrisp Apples (1991), Fruit Gushers (1991), Bagel Bites (1991), AriZona Iced Tea (1992), and Orbitz with the weird little edible balls in a clear liquid (1996) hit store shelves.
- Pizza Hut wowed Super Bowl fans with Stuffed Crust Pizza in 1995.
This decade marked the arrival of biscotti to the United States. People in Italy, as you learned above, had been enjoying biscotti for centuries. It became the perfect accompaniment to other Italian imports, such as sun-dried tomatoes.
To read more on how Italian food changed the world, check out How Italian Food Conquered the World (2011) by John F. Mariani (Amazon) or Delizia!: The Epic History of the Italians and Their Food (2010) by John Dickie (Amazon).
Is Biscotti Supposed to Be Hard?
Yes, biscotti was made for dunking into a beverage. The original biscotti, back in the fassdfsd, Gaius Plinius Secundus (AD 23/24 – AD 79), you know him as the Roman author Pliny the Elder, believed the twice-baking method of making biscotti would enable these cookies to last for centuries.
I can’t get them to last more than three days, what with two teen boys up in here.
Because the second baking drew moisture out of the biscuit, it rendered the biscotti hard, sturdy and, importantly, resistant to mold.
Consequently, biscotti turned out to be the ideal food to store.
Susan Russo, Not All Biscotti Are Created Equal, NPR: Kitchen Window, Accessed February 20, 2024.
They soon became a favored provision of sailors, including Christopher Columbus, who traveled at sea for months at a time with the crunchy cargo.
It didn’t take long for other nationalities to discover the utility of these twice-baked biscuits. British hardtack — a twice-baked, dry, hard biscuit made from flour, water and salt — and German zwieback — a twice-baked, crisp, sweetened bread — are both spinoffs of the Italian original.
Authentic biscotti is hard. Some recipes include ingredients that lend a certain softness to the finished product or nix the second bake for a lighter biscotti. However, it wouldn’t technically be biscotti if there is no second baking time, since biscotti means “twice baked.
What Is Biscotti Made Of?
The ingredients in biscotti depend on where you live, where you are visiting, or where you’re vacationing.
Food historians credit bakers in Tuscany with first creating biscotti with almonds from the groves of Prato. But other cultures have their own spins.
In the Greek version, orange juice, lemon rind and toasted sesame seeds give a savory flavor.Moroccan fekkas are filled with almonds and raisins.
And French croquets de carcassonne are made rich with, naturellement, butter.
Emily Dwass, Cantucci — Biscotti Di Prato, Los Angeles Times, May 6, 2010, Accessed February 22, 2024.
Traditional biscotti recipes frequently include a handful of ingredients:
Recipes including baking powder cause a slight rise in the biscotti, yielding a slightly lighter version than those recipes without baking powder.
What Makes a Good Biscotti?
Biscotti standards vary depending on where you are (and who you are).
What makes a good biscotti? Since they are meant to be dunked into espresso or sweet wine, they should be very dry, “almost brittle,” says Anna Maria Lepore, executive vice president of Ferrara Foods and Confections, the century-old Manhattan Italian bakery which, in its first expansion outside New York, has opened five espresso bars in the Washington area.
Caroline E. Mayer, Biscotti: Espresso Pros Judge the Rest, The Washington Post, December 15, 1992, Accessed February 20, 2024.
Biscotti should be dry enough that “if you looked at it, you’d think they would break your teeth,” explains Lepore. “But they should be light enough that they actually break easily in your mouth.”
Additionally, Lepore says, a biscotti should be porous enough to absorb liquid but not so much that it will turn into an edible ball of mush — and make your coffee a cup of muck in the process.
You’ve probably had the mushy biscotti before. That’s not fun. Taste, however, is subjective. If you like a twice-baked cookie labeled “biscotti,” then it’s good.
Go traditional or make it special. Have fun with it. I’d suggest baking a recipe “as is” first (unless you already know what you’re doing), and then playing around with it. Whatever you do, write in your cookbook so you remember.
Feel free to experiment with add-ins: Sub in hazelnuts or pistachios for the almonds. Add mini chocolate chips or dried cranberries, or a teaspoon of citrus zest.
Molly O’Neill, Biscotti, New York Times Cooking, (Maybe) May 23, 1993, Accessed February 21, 2024.
Or take the cookies over the top by drizzling with melted chocolate, glazing with icing or dusting with sprinkles. You do you.
Are All Biscotti Made with Oil?
Traditional biscotti don’t use butter or oil. But many modern biscotti recipes take advantage of butter or oil for flavor and softness. An egg or multiple eggs are commonly found in the biscotti dough.
The more fat compared to flour in your biscotti recipe, the softer your biscotti. In other words, the more dry ingredients in the cookie recipe contribute to a crisper biscotti.
What Kinds of Biscotti Are There?
The sky is the limit. Biscotti is no longer something closer to hardtack than a breakfast delight or an after dinner treat. Creative bakers have played around with the classic biscotti recipe, adding ingredients as they please.
All-purpose flour, almond meal, or almond flour, unsalted butter or olive oil (or even a neutral oil such as canola oil or vegetable oil), have made their way into biscotti dough.
You can find recipes for everything from the usual almond biscotti or biscotti made with anise extract to lemon biscotti, chocolate chip biscotti, and chocolate biscotti.
People embellish the basic almond biscotti recipe with dried fruit, such as dried cranberries, or different fruity flavors (think: lemon zest or orange zest). Some recipes include white wine or red wine.
Biscotti can include all manner of nuts, too. The humble pine nut, toasted almonds, chopped almonds, pistachios, or hazelnuts — you are only limited by your creativity.
But it isn’t only what’s inside that counts. The top of a biscotti cookie could be drizzled with melted chocolate (milk chocolate, dark chocolate, or white chocolate) or a powdered sugar glaze and flavored with a touch of almond extract, vanilla extract, cocoa powder, or lemon juice.
You could make a double chocolate chip biscotti with a white chocolate drizzle, an almond biscotti with a dark chocolate glaze, or pistachio and dried cranberries flavored with almond extract and served plain. Biscotti purists may sneer and scowl at your recipe index, but you do you.
What Do You Need to Bake Biscotti?
Homemade Italian biscotti is fun to make. You’ll need a baking sheet lined with parchment paper or a reusable silicone mat to keep the dough from sticking to the baking sheet. Then set your oven to the right temperature, according to your recipe, before you begin. It needs time to heat up.
An electric stand mixer is helpful. It makes combining the dough ingredients a quick process. Today’s recipes can use anything from granulated sugar to light brown sugar, salted butter or unsalted butter, baking powder or salt. No matter the ingredients in your recipe, a stand mixer is thorough and efficient.
Then there are the mix-ins, such as pistachios or chopped almonds, chocolate chips or dried cranberries. A rubber spatula can help you scoot ingredients off the bowl sides and ensure more even mixing.
Other dry ingredients include flour. Many modern recipes use all-purpose flour, but you will also see some with almond flour or almond meal.
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This Italian cookie is simple to make. The only difficult part is the time required for a double bake. You'll bake the biscotti a second time until golden brown. It can be hard to tell when certain types of biscotti are finished baking (I'm looking at you, chocolate biscotti). Use the time range in your recipe to help you determine when it's done.
Let the biscotti cool on the baking sheet and then move them to a cooling rack to finish cooling.
Once baked, the typical biscotti can be stored for weeks in an airtight, reusable container.
Are You Supposed to Dunk Biscotti in a Beverage? Which One?
Some people have strong emotions about the proper way to eat Italian biscotti. It depends on your recipe (a crumblier biscotti cookie may be difficult to dip in a liquid), your preferences, and where you roam.
I dip my biscotti in coffee, but I make chocolate biscotti the most (it's such a great pairing). When I finally make traditional biscotti, I intend to find the Italian wine, Vin Santo, and to try it that way.
But I'm not hung up on how I'm "supposed" to eat it. How I like it is how I like it. *shrug*
How Italians Dunk Biscotti Cookies In Italy
"When in Rome," as they say. Let's take a quick look at Italian's and how they dunk a biscotto.
Adelpe Volpi, a Napa Valley wine-grower's wife of Italian descent . . . told me the way to eat these cookies was to dip them in wine.
Jean Anderson, The American Century Cookbook: The Most Popular Recipes of the Century (1907), Page 614.
"Any kind of wine." In fact, she called them "wine sticks."
If you're in Italy, pay attention to the locals and follow the local custom if you'd prefer to blend in.
How Americans Dunk a Biscotti Cookie In the United States
It won't surprise you to learn that in the U.S., people dunk biscotti cookies in an assortment of beverages, including coffee, cappuccino (and the like), hot chocolate, milk (or chocolate milk), and even hot tea.
Some people choose not to dip biscotti in any beverage and eat it as is. Depending on the cookie's authenticity, it may be too hard to eat without a softening dunk.
Cantucci Vs Biscotti
Cantucci or biscotti, it's hard to say. ". . . Antonio Mattei manufacturer of Cantucci, Biscotti, and other goods. It is here that the recipe for Prato Almond biscuits was created, today known all over the world (as Cantucci or Cantuccini)," according to the Antonio Mattei Biscuit Factory website.
These hard, crunchy bars are more accurately called biscotti di Prato. True cantucci, which means "corners" and probably refers to the angular shape of the cookies, are made from bread dough, olive oil, aniseed, and sugar.
Franco Galli, The Il Fornaio Baking Book (1993) on the recipe for Cantucci Di Prato: Almond Cookies from Prato, Page 136.
But the wrong name has stuck here and elsewhere, and whether you call them cantucci or biscotti di Prato, they are best dipped in a glas of Vin Santo or Elba's celebrated Morellino wine before eating.
The addition of hazelnuts to these Prato cookies is a custom borrowed from nearby Pistoia.
We've now seen the term "Vin Santo" several times. What is Vin Santo and why does it rank so high on the "dunk biscotti in Vin Santo" list?
This rich aromatic Tuscan wine is a delicious dessert wine, traditionally used to dip Cantucci biscuits after a meal.
Antonio and Priscilla Carluccio, The Carluccio's Collection: Baking (1999), Page 33.
Some attribute the use of the word santo here to the fact that this wine is used sometimes for celebration of the Mass, others because the wine originated from Xantos in Greece.
It is produced from Malvasia and Trebbiano grapes which, after harvesting, are put on straw mats to dry to increase the sugar content before being turned into wine.
Depending upon the fermentation, the ageing process in wooden casks for at least three years produced a wine that may be sweet, semi-sweet, or dry. Vin Santo is also used as a flavoring in pastries and creams.
Vin Santo is Italian for "holy wine." The perfect accompaniment for a heavenly treat? You be the judge.
The Joy of Biscotti
I can't explain why, but these hard, twice-baked Italian cookies make morning better. Whether it's the run of rainy days we've had in Pennsylvania, the fact that it's almost March (and I'm ready for winter to end), or my Northern Italian roots, biscotti makes it better.
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Related Recipes and Resources
- Triple Chocolate Nut Biscotti
- Large List of Biscotti Cookbooks
- Biscotti History: Who Invented Biscotti and Where Biscotti Originated
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