amaretti cookies

Amaretti Cookies

Sardinians love these big, soft amaretti cookies. When traveling through this beautiful island, almost every shop I visited had a giant cookie jar on the counter filled with their favorite cookie; I even saw them all over the airport in Cagliari. They have a nice crunch on the outside, while the inside is soft with a strong almond taste. Amaretti cookies can be found all over Italy, but Sardinian's soft version is my favorite.  In addition, they can be found both piped or round so if you don’t have a piping bag, feel free to use a cookie scoop and make them as drop cookies.  They taste delicious either way.

30 cookies 

Active time: 15 minutes 

Total time: 35 minutes

3 cups almond flour

1 ½ cups confectioner’s sugar

½ teaspoon kosher salt

Zest of one lemon

4 large egg whites, room temperature

2 teaspoons almond extract

1 teaspoon Amaretto, optional

Slivered almonds, for garnish

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper.

In a large bowl, combine flour, confectioner’s sugar, salt, and lemon zest.  Mix to combine.

Using a hand mixer, whisk egg whites on high speed to a soft peak, about 3 minutes.  You know you have soft peaks when the egg whites have some volume, simply lift the beaters up and small peaks form that quickly deflate back into the whipped egg white mixture. Add almond extract and amaretto, if using, and mix again to combine.

Fold the egg whites into the flour mixture until just combined.  Line two baking sheets with parchment.

Fill a piping bag with a star tip and about half of the dough and pipe circles of dough, about 1 ½ in diameter directly onto the baking sheet, about 1 inch apart. Place a slivered almond in the middle of each cookie.

Place the cookies, one sheet at a time, on the middle rack of the oven.

Bake for 10 minutes, until cookies begin to harden. and the bottoms are golden brown. Transfer to a wire rack to cool.