Chocolate Almond Biscotti

my 2nd attempt at biscotti, the first was really long ago, like 2006 or something. was craving for something chocolatey and at the same time captivated by the biscotti over at elyn of e's joie, so i decided to go for it. found out that she's a fan of anna olsen's program called sugar on afc (asian food channel), so am i! and this recipe is adapted from her program so i'm pretty sure it'll be good.

am back from my korea trip not too long ago. it was really really fantastic, almost close to perfect. in fact i wished i never came home! overall it was alot better than i expected. i'll blog more abt the trip in my next entry but meanwhile, here's some of the food pics. i don't think the food was actually very good, we had pork for almost every meal coz apparently pork is very cheap in korea so it was pretty sickening. only 2 meals consisted of chicken and there was no beef at all. plus the side dishes, its always kimchi, beansprouts, seaweed (and laver/kelp soup), fishcake-like dish etc. pretty boring and predictable i would say. some people who couldnt take in another meal of pork & kimchi actually bought cheesecakes and bread from the bakeries LOL. it was ok i would say, the food is still edible but nothing to shout about. here are some pics of the food :


breakfast in jeju island - abalone porridge, with hardly any abalone in it

Pierre Herme's Ispahan - Recreated

isnt this gorgeous? fresh raspberries & a lychee in the middle sit on rose scented italian meringue buttercream and sandwiched between two pink macaron shells. the name of this macaron is called ispahan - solely created by pierre herme, the picasso of pastry but i prefer to call him the gucci or LV in the pastry world :p like i mentioned, if you're on a macaron frenzy (both in making & eating), then you'll most probably heard of pierre herme. and if you know pierre herme, then you're most likely to know his world-famous ispahan - adored by fans around the world! you can read all about him here. anyway, i've been dying to make these eons ago but i couldnt find really good raspberries to begin with. so when i was out grocery shopping yesterday, i saw some really firm, ripe & fresh ones and quickly grabbed 3 punnets (despite them being so expensive)!

the innards. my first attempt had been satisfactory, coz its super easy to put it together. only thing is, i was a little worried coz this is the 1st time i make macaron shells THIS big. i mean, its almost double the size of the normal macarons. so i was really afraid they wouldnt develop feet or something. but i guess my fears were unfounded. only thing is, i find that the shells were a little too thin. anyhow i love it coz its a blast on the senses - looks good and tastes good (at least for me). the tartness of the raspberries really balance up the sweetness of the macarons. and the lychees were rinsed to take away more sweetness so i kinda like the fact that they're not overly sweet.