Week 8: Italian Cookies

Italian Cookies was a night of epic fails for me and Jaimie. Things usually turn out alright when we work together, but I think we had to remake every single thing we did that night. The first of these epic fails resulted in making marzipan THREE times. Why, you ask? Oh I  just can't read my thermometer.

Marzipan is actually a fairly simple recipe, started by bringing your sugar and water to 235 degrees, at which point you stir in the almond flour and egg whites, mixing it to paste. Then comes the fun part using goods from the hardware store to smush it all about on a marble surface until it's smooth:

I know you wanted to see the goofy hat

Once it's finished, you can use it for a variety of bases for cakes and cookies, or you can mold into stuff like these:

I didn't have the patience to do this

We used the marzipan for these Raisin cake-like cookies who's name is currently escaping me. But it's in italian so you wouldn't know anyway. We'll call them galleti raisenetti:

Next up on the list were these Espresso Biscotti-a coffee flavored cookie to dunk in coffee? What's not to love? The only problem we had here is that 2 OUNCES of salt is a lot more than the 2 TEASPOONS the recipe called for. Oops like woah, especially with the size of the batch, but I was just happy this one wasn't on my head:

We were so happy the second batch didn't come out like a salt lick that I actually forgot to take a photo. But you all know what biscotti look like right? So no loss there. 

Finally, because we can't resist anything with coconut, we made some Coconut Meringues:

Here is the work by the rest of my class. First up is the Florentines, which I hate to say, resemble the fake cat throw up you can buy at Spencer's gifts. I know, gross, but now that I've said it can't you see it? A great gift for the fruitcake lovers in your life (if they exist):

Next up were the Lengues de Chat ('Cat's Tongues' aka Milanos). They are a pretty delicate cookie resulting in another pastry school fail for the evening (again, not mine this time!) before getting it right:

oopsies

better this time

Hope you enjoy my continual screw ups. Ciao for now!