CookEat Recipe
Amaretti I
Light almond biscuits made by working egg whites with sugar before adding finely chopped almonds, baked into rounded shells with an airy interior.
Method
Steps
Step 1
Gather the ingredients: 250 g fine caster sugar, plus a little extra only if needed to firm the dough; 150 g blanched sweet almonds; 2 egg whites; Plain edible wafer sheets, enough for about 30 small biscuit bases.
Step 2
Dry the blanched almonds at 120°C for about 10–15 minutes without browning, then cool completely. Chop or pulse very finely, stopping before they become an oily paste. Use sweet almonds throughout; a few optional drops of commercially prepared food-grade bitter-almond flavouring may supply the historical bitter-almond aroma.
Step 3
Work the two egg whites and measured caster sugar with a wooden spoon for about 30 minutes until thick and well combined, then stir in the finely chopped almonds. The dough should be firm enough to shape into small balls. If too soft, add extra caster sugar a teaspoon at a time. If too firm, whisk a little additional egg white separately and add only a teaspoon at a time until workable; this extra white is a consistency adjustment, not another compulsory whole white.
Step 4
Heat the oven to 160°C. Put edible wafer sheets or separate wafer discs on a baking tray. Shape about 30 small walnut-sized balls, flatten each to about 1 cm thick and place well apart on the wafers, allowing at least 4 cm between them because they spread and puff substantially.
Step 5
Bake for about 18–25 minutes until lightly golden and set into light raised shells. They should have an airy, partly hollow interior rather than a dense marzipan centre. Cool before lifting and trim any excess edible wafer around each biscuit, leaving the base attached. Store completely cooled biscuits in a dry airtight container.
Step 6
Instead of edible wafer bases, use small pieces of baking paper, removing the paper after cooling. A third tray method uses about 5 g butter to grease the tray and a mixture of 5 g flour and 5 g icing sugar to dust it; shake away excess and keep the same spacing and baking method.
Step 7
For the optional slightly darker colour, mix a few drops of ready-to-use food-grade plain caramel colouring into the dough before shaping. Use only enough to tint it lightly; the main version remains naturally golden.
Cooked it? Rate it.
Cooked 0 times