Hazelnut and cocoa amaretti

A recipe from cooking-ez.com

For 25 pieces, you will need:

• 1 250 g ground hazelnuts
• 2 200 g caster sugar
• 3 20 g powdered cocoa
• 4 60 g egg white
• 5 3 tablespoons icing sugar
• 6 25 wholes hazelnuts
• Total weight: 600 grams

Times:

Preparation	Resting	Cooking	Start to finish
25 min.	10 min.	15 min.	50 min.

Step by step recipe

• 1: Pour 250 g ground hazelnuts, 200 g caster sugar and 20 g powdered cocoa into a bowl.
• 2: Whisk these powders together.
• 3: Add 60 g egg white (60 g = 2 whites) and start mixing with a spoon or spatula.
• 4: Finish mixing by hand, it's the easiest way...
• 5: ...until you obtain a homogeneous paste.
• 6: Divide the dough into 20-25 g pieces.
• 7: Preheat your oven to 170°C (340°F).
  Roll into balls between the palms of your hands.
  Note: If you have children around, let them help you, they'll love the "play dough" aspect.
• 8: Pour 3 tablespoons icing sugar into a shallow dish (or better still, a mould if you have one).
  Coat the dough balls with powdered sugar, in packs of around 5-6, turning the mould on itself.
• 9: Then roll the balls in the palm of your hands to remove excess powdered sugar.
  You want a very thin layer of powdered sugar all over the dough ball.
• 10: Do this for all the balls and place them on a sheet of baking paper (this is important), set on a baking sheet.
• 11: Place a hazelnut on each ball, and press down with your fingers to flatten the ball a little and make it crackle on the sides.
• 12: Do this for all the balls...
• 13: ...and bake at 170°C (340°F) for about 15 minutes.
• 14: Cool on a wire rack and enjoy.

Remarks

You can mix the dough entirely by hand - it takes 2 or 3 minutes, so there's no need to get out your food processor.
Preferably use shelled hazelnuts to garnish the top.
For a more subtle version, replace half the hazelnut powder with almond powder.

---