I'll always remember it fondly - finishing my first meal in Florence (I was travelling with Mum on my first trip to Italy) with a plate of biscotti and Vin Santo. It was utterly delicious and felt so authentic!

Vin Santo is a traditional Tuscan sticky (dessert wine) and I'm sure you'll be able to find a bottle in your local liquor store. You could always swap it for your local dessert wine - a Juniper Estate Cane Cut Riesling or Vasse Felix Cane Cut Semillon.

Many cantucci recipes use almonds but I particularly love hazelnuts in this recipe.

Happy baking!

Sioban

Cantucci di Noce (Hazelnut Biscotti) Recipe

Makes about 80 biscuits

Ingredients

• 3 x 50g eggs

• 300 g caster sugar

• 500g plain flour

• 1 sachet of lievito (16g) ** or 1 heaped teaspoon of baking powder

• 300 g hazelnuts, toasted

• 100 g butter at room temperature

Method

Preheat oven to 170 degrees

In a bowl, cream the butter and sugar until light and then add the eggs one at a time, fold in the flour, lievito and hazelnuts.

Roughly mould into a log shape about 1 cm in height and 4 cm in width (this quantity will make approximately4 logs).  Place on a cooking tray lined with baking paper and cook in oven for 15-20 minutes. Once it has gone golden brown, remove biscuits and leave them to cool.  Once they are cool, using a bread knife cut biscuits into about 1cm in width.

Place biscuits on a baking tray on top of grease proof paper and bake in oven at 160 degrees for about 8 - 10 minutes, or until they go light brown and crunchy.  Remove from oven and leave to cool.  Store in an airtight container for up to 2 weeks. 

**The sachet of lievito (which is a raising agent) can be found at Italian stores (supermarkets) The Re Store in Perth sells them.