I Monaci di Nonna Rita ___

I Monaci di Nonna Rita

Ingredients

External Chocolate Dough:

  • 1 pound all purpose flour
  • 3.5 ounces sugar
  • 1 tablespoon olive oil
  • 1 tablespoon milk
  • 1 tablespoon bitter cocoa powder
  • 1.5 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1 lemon zested
  • 1 teaspoon cinnamon
  • 0.5 teaspoon clove powder
  • 1.5 cups Vin Cotto

Internal Pasta Reale:

  • 0.5 pound raw almonds
  • 0.25 pound sugar
  • 1 lemon zested
  • 0.25 teaspoon anise extract
  • 2 egg whites
  • pinch cinnamon

For the Icing:

  • 0.5 pound powder sugar
  • 2 tablespoons cocoa powder
  • 2 lemons, juiced
  • 2 drops anise extract

Directions

For the Monaci:

  1. As a first step,  prepare the Internal Pasta Reale. Boil the almonds and remove the peel. Once the almonds are cold and somewhat dry, put them in a food processor or a blender and chop them finely.
  2. Put the chopped almonds in a bowl, add the lemon zest, a pinch of cinnamon, the sugar and the egg whites. Mix until the egg whites dilute the sugar and the mixture becomes a paste. Set aside.
  3. Now prepare the External dough. In the bowl of a stand mixer, put all the ingredients of the external dough and mix them all very well.
  4. The ball of dough you obtain will be rather soft, so add a little flour to help you remove it from the mixer and put is aside.
  5. On a wooden board, take a chunk of the external dough and with a rolling pin, flatten it longways about 2 1/2" wide and 1/4" thick. Cut around the edges to make the dough straight and even on all sides.
  6. Deposit at the center a line of the internal dough of about 1" wide and 1/2" thick. Enclose the internal dough with external dough so that it looks like a tube. Flatten the dough with your hands and with a sharp knife, cut it diagonally every 1" to get your cookies.
  7. Put all your cookies on a baking sheet and bake them at 350F for 20 minutes.

Nonna Rita Tribuzio

Prepare the Icing:

  1. Once all the cookies have been baked and cooled off you can put icing on them.
  2. In a bowl, add all your icing ingredients and mix them well.  The icing will be very soft.
  3. With a brush or your finger, put some icing on each cookie and let them dry.
  4. Once they all dry, they are ready to be served.