Today, I baked one of my favorite cookies, Fagottini d'Albicocca, jam pockets with apricot jam in them. The dough for the cookies is a delicate pasta frolla with lemon and vanilla extracts. The recipe is from Franco Galli's cookbook - The Il Fornaio Baking Book, lots of good Italian recipes here.
Christmas baking continues today with taralluces - little taralle cookies. My Grandmother Rinaldi used to make these and taught my Mom how to make them. Mom would make them for special occasions like Christmas. The recipe is pretty straight forward. The hardest part is getting the cookies shaped prior to baking because the dough is rather sticky and requires a quick and steady well-floured hand to roll a small 'snake' of dough and tie in a knot. Here's a picture of the shaped cookies prior to baking -
