JACKPOT bakes Paleo and Vegan Chocolate Pistachio, Cranberry and Almond Biscotti

Hello All!

Mid week means it’s time for a recipe post. My dear friend Ms Shortee shared a link for some Paleo chocolate biscotti she found on the internet. I have baked a few Paleo items here and there but not a lot leaning more to vegan baking and gluten-free baking so I was interested in seeing how this Paleo recipe would turn out. I definitely have seen a big trend towards people on Paleo diets as the new craze these days for exercise is Cross Fit. I don’t think I have the energy to do Cross Fit but the whole Paleo eating interested me quite a bit so I wanted to see how it would affect the results of my baking.

So what does eating on a Paleo diet mean for you? Here are two good link for foods you should eat if you are on a Paleo diet and a summary of what a Paleo really means http://www.paleoplan.com/resources/paleo-plan-food-guide/ and http://greatist.com/health/the-ultimate-guide-to-eating-paleo-022012/. Mr C was talking to me recently about the Paleo diet aka what he calls the Caveman Diet and I was interested in listening to what types of foods you are allowed to eat if you are eating Paleo. He was telling me to just imagine you are back in the old days during the caveman era and you had to hunt for food and basically what a cave man would eat during that time i.e. vegetables, fruit, meat and eggs. On a Paleo diet you would want to avoid having any grains of any sort hence why in most the baking recipes that are Paleo, the main ingredients used are almond flour or coconut flour as these are better for you to digest than any other flours.

I adapted my recipe from the Paleo Spirit website (http://paleospirit.com/2012/double-chocolate-pistachio-biscotti-paleo-vegan/). I loved the fact that the biscotti was Vegan and Paleo at the same time without using any egg. The recipe is quite healthy considering there are no refined sugars or oil in the batter. I have to admit that my biscotti didn’t look quite like the website or even resemble a typical biscotti shape but I think this was due to the fact that I was not used to the textures and the correct consistency needed for the batter when making biscuits such as biscotti. I thought my biscotti were still quite decent for a first experiment. This will definitely not be my last experiment as I want to try other paleo biscotti recipes and make Paleo banana pancakes and muffins even. Stay tuned for this in upcoming future posts.

Now back to the recipe:

PALEO & VEGAN CHOCOLATE PISTACHIO, CRANBERRY & ALMOND BISCOTTI

Ingredients:

1 and 1/4 cups of raw blanched almond meal
1/4 cup of raw cacao powder
1/2 tsp of baking soda
a pinch of salt
1/3 cup of pure maple syrup
a mixture of various nuts and dried fruits to your liking (I used unsalted pistachios, cranberries & raw blanched almonds but you can use whatever you prefer) – roughly about 1 cup’s worth

Method:

Preheat your oven to 180 degrees Celsius.
Line a baking tray with parchment paper/baking paper and set aside.
Add the dry ingredients (almond meal, cacao powder, baking soda and salt) into a large mixing bowl and combine with a wooden spoon.
Add in the maple syrup to the dry ingredients mixture and combine with a wooden spoon until a dough forms.
Fold in the nuts and dried fruits carefully into the dough.
Form the dough into a rectangular log on your baking sheet. (Note that the dough may be quite sticky when trying to mold the dough into a log)
Place the baking tray into the oven and bake for 15 minutes.
Allow the log to cool on a wire rack until it has cooled completely.
Cut the log into 1.5cm slices using a bread knife. Cut the slices on the diagonal to create that biscotti shape.
Place the slices on the sides back onto the baking paper and bake for a further 15 minutes or until your biscotti are nice and crunchy.
Cool your biscotti on a wire rack.
Enjoy your biscotti with a cup of coffee or tea!

So they might not look like your typical biscotti but they tasted pretty alright to me. Once I took out my biscotti from the first baking time I almost didn’t want to put them back in as they tasted like a soft flourless chocolate cake that I couldn’t stop picking at some of the leftover biscotti that didn’t make it into the oven or rather that I consumed too quickly as it was rather addictive ;P I will definitely work on the presentation of these biscotti so that they look more like biscotti. Also because my log ended up rather flat and not as high as it should have been, I will need to ensure next time I make a narrower log so that it is easier to slice through for the second baking time. I gave this batch to Ms Shortee to try and she seemed to enjoy it despite her saying they were a tad chewy and soft in the middle. Perhaps I will need to bake them for longer in the oven for next time to get that extra crispiness and crunchiness that biscotti are so well-known for.