Cranberry-Almond Whole Wheat Biscotti

I've never made biscotti before, so this week I looked up a few recipes to see what kinds of ingredients are used, and how they could be made healthfully! Most of the recipes used butter or oil, but this one uses only eggs to hold the dry ingredients together, so very low in fat! This biscotti recipe is very easy to mix up and bake, and holds together very well during the slicing and the second baking time. I found this recipe online on another blog, http://avecgourmandise.blogspot.com. I made this recipe twice this week, and even made my own variation of it with cinnamon chips and raisins - see end of recipe. You can definitely mix and match whatever (dry) mix-in ingredients you have on hand (in the same amount as the original recipe). I think next time I will try lemon and dried blueberries or cashew and dried cherries!

Cranberry Almond Whole Wheat Biscotti

Ingredients:
3/4 cup white whole wheat flour

1/2 cup all purpose flour

1 tsp baking powder

1/3 cup sugar

1/4 tsp salt

1/2 cup sliced and toasted almonds

1/4 cup dried cranberries

2 large eggs

1 tsp vanilla extract

1/4 tsp almond extract

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line baking sheet with parchment paper or Silpat. Mix together flours, baking powder, sugar, and salt. Mix in the nuts and cranberries. In a separate small bowl, whisk together the eggs and extracts. Add to the flour mixture; stir until combined. With floured hands, shape the dough into a loaf about 1 inch thick and 4 inches wide. Transfer to baking sheet.

Bake until risen and firm, about 25 minutes. Reduce oven temp to 300 degrees F. Let the loaf cool on a cutting board for about 10 minutes, then cut diagonally into 1/2" slices. Arrange slices cut-side down and bake 10 minutes, then turn slices over and bake until dried, about 10 minutes more. Remove from baking sheet and cool on a wire rack.

Nutritional info: about 70 calories per piece; very low in fat

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Cinnamon chip/Raisin variation

add 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon to the dry ingredients

replace the toasted almonds with cinnamon chips

replace the dried cranberries with raisins (if they are large, cut in half)

add an addition 1/4 tsp of vanilla and omit the almond extract

Mix and bake as described above