Ossi Du Mordere
My daily life is in disarray!
There seems to be a never ending procession of prospective property managers and furniture removalists parading through our soon to be vacated home. Once the “home beautiful” crowd had finished opening cupboards and measuring the furniture, our space rapidly transformed into a building site.
The painter came in like a whirlwind. I only rescued my half eaten breakfast from the table moments before a plastic shroud descended, and despite Melbourne enduring the coldest winter in decades, we were made to suffer wide open windows and doors at the painter’s insistence. Thankfully we hadn’t yet begun to pack our clothes so the thermal under things got an outing, their last hurrah before we shift to the tropics!
Respite came with the weekend. I cranked the central heating up to 23C and grateful for the quiet, I cleared the kitchen bench of dust and rubble to whip up a recipe I’d selected from Carol Field’s “The Italian Baker,” the current choice of the blogging book club for cooks, The Cookbook Guru. I chose the last recipe in the book.
Ossi du Mordere are essentially crunchy cocoa flavoured amaraetti, but I decided to trial them with hazelnuts so that in one fell swoop I could empty the hazelnut, cocoa and icing sugar jars. With the best of intentions I measured out a double quanitity of nuts which meant my cocoa measure was a little short of the required amount, then I was light on for icing sugar too so I replaced the remainder needed with castor sugar. I threw in 3 large egg whites without measuring. Perhaps the paste was a little soft, but the ossi du mordere baked into crisp, crunchy chocolate hazelnut deliciousness.
My only comment about the recipe is that the trays of biscuits needed 35 minutes to dry out to an even crispness, a little longer than stated.
As an aside, you need to know that I’ve had The Italian Baker on my bookshelp for 25years and have never cooked from it before. It’s an enticing looking book…..
This is my mash up of Carol Field’s Ossi Du Mordere from the The Italian Baker.
200g raw hazelnuts
240g icing (confectioner’s) sugar
160g castor sugar
36g Dutch process dark cocoa powder
3 large egg whites
Preheat the oven to 150C fan forced and line ovenproof trays with baking paper.
In the jug of the food processor grind the nuts and castor sugar until fine. Add the icing sugar and cocoa powder and pulse to thoroughly combine.
Add the egg whites and pulse the motor to mix the ingredients to a paste.
Drop teaspoons full of the paste onto the baking trays, allowing a little room to spread.
Bake until the cookies are puffed, firm to the touch and lift off the trays without breaking, about 35 minutes.They should be glossy and have a crackled surface.
Makes about 50.
Will keep in an airtight container for a couple of weeks.
Tomorrow the painter returns and I’m out of here!!
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40 comments on “Ossi Du Mordere”
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Please Pass the Recipe by Sandra Gay is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported License.
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Oh yum! Will be trying these as soon as I can get my hands on some hazelnuts– I have egg whites left over from another project and just can’t bring myself to make meringues again.
x Molly from Rye Humour
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Molly these are seriously good. They’re the perfect alternative to meringues when you have pesky leftover eggwhites
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I am so looking forward to it. My recent experimentation in the world of custards and curds is leaving me with SO many egg whites!
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Oh good gracious, first batch just out of the oven… Someone stop me before I devour them all at once! Thanks so much for the tip!
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You are very welcome 😊
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Absolutely love the photo! My husband would love to eat such hazelnut cookies! Are they very sweet? because it seems too many sugar for my taste
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The bitter unsweetened cocoa balances out the sugar content. I’m not keen on very sweet foods either but I liked these a lot
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Thanks! 🙂
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Reblogged this on FOODS AND MOODS and commented:
Love love love the picture! I want to bake them this weekend. Friday evening guests having crème brulee for dessert and we will take “Ossi du Mordere” as a little gift to our friends on Saturday evening… How perfect is that? Thank you so much ladyredspecs!
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Enjoy….
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The warmth and holding a new grand baby will make you forget about cold, dust and all the inconvenience. The cookies do look very crispy and I like the idea of the hazelnuts.
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So true Karen. A baby melt your heart and makes your worries seem so insignificant!
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I love hazelnuts with chocolate so that combo sounds like a winner. It is odd isn’t it that this book seems to have some issues with methods etc?
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Many, many cookbooks have inaccuracies, in fact i’ve written whole posts on the problem. What is hard to understand is that this book, which is considered an authority is causing frustrations to experienced cooks. The ossi du mordere were wonderful made with hazelnuts Sherry, well worth trying
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Hi Sherry I’ve been trying to leave a comment on your post for polenta cookies but your host doesn’t seem to like me! Anyway, just wanted to say i think they look delicious, I’m particularly fond of this style of Italian sweet biscuit. I’ll be looking out for you at EYB in Canberra
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Your move sounds exciting! You’re already a grand ma, though, right? Love these cookies.
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Yes no3 on the way, my eldest daughter this time, her first. Exciting times ahead…
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These look delicious Sandra! I’m going to pick up some hazelnuts this week to give them a try…
Hope the painting went well and that you’re feeling warm again! 🙂
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Painter has finished, and I’ve just finished a massive clean up, the fine dust from sanding had settled on everything! I’d love to hear how you go with the recipe
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yum, these sound delish to me. Glad you found something worth baking from the book. I’m definitely finding it interesting the challenges that we’re having with the recipes in the book. I’m a little surprised that a book that is meant to be an authority would be so inaccurate for people given the era it was originally published. Lucky most of us are experienced at adapting our baking to suit our instincts.
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They were super good and super easy Leah, will definitely be making these again!
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Reblogged this on The Cookbook Guru and commented:
In the midst of moving house preparations Lady Red Specs from Please Pass The Recipe has produced some delicious hazelnut and chocolate biscuits for us as part of this months The Cookbook Guru. As an added bonus she has adapted them to be gluten free.
Happy Reading and Happy Baking,
Leah
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I must try some of Field’s sweet things too. These look great. Nothing like making a few ‘Bones of the Dead’ when faced with a freezing winter and a gutting of ones’ house.Looking forward to returning to my oven, if only to contribute to the cookbook’s featured book this month.
Stay warm.
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It’s always nice to home after a holiday although you might want a pack some warm weather!
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Poor you having to suffer the cold. I have been stuck in front of the heater most of July! Where are you off too?
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Shifting to Brissy Anne, to be near our daughter who’s expecting. My aching joints will be pleased with the warmth!
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Well done cooking anything in the circumstances. I have (as always) egg whites galore in the freezer so I will have to check out the recipe.
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Glenda these made a fabulous change to the usual nutty meringue, the hazelnut was delicious. I’m always looking for recipes to use up egg whites too
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Lovely! I have some cocoa that needs using up, so this might be the perfect recipe. Your baking always makes me hungry. Thanks for sharing! 🙂
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You’re welcome Anita, we loved these cookies, hope you do too…
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Glad you 1) found a GF recipe in the book to test, 2) was able to deplete stores of nuts, etc. I second Cherry’s suggestion. I always feed our workmen and they love it and I hope they do a fantastic job – at least they keep coming back to do more jobs for us! I’m finding Field’s book a little inexact and perhaps untested. I trust your judgement more as you actually make the stuff in a home kitchen environment.
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Thanks Deb, these were fabulous, everyone except the painter loved them!
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these look chewy and delicious. Leave one for the painter so he does an extra fantastic job!
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The painter has finished and done a great job, I don’t think he cared much for my baking though, the mug of tea always disappeared but the goodies were often returned!
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Ha! Glad it’s all done. That made me laugh, I had made some very healthy muffins for an after school activity today and the little girl who ate one, took a bite or two and left it sitting there. 😁
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