Chocolate Chip Mandel Bread Recipe | The Nosher (2024)

Dessert

The perfect bite.

ByDawn Lerman|

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I was the only person in Miss Duckler’s kindergarten class without a sibling. I had wished so long for a sister. But I had also wished on a star for a Baby Alive doll, and that never came true. So when my Aunt Jeannie picked me up from school and shared the birth of my sister April, I couldn’t really believe it. I started cheering, and skipping in circles. “I have a sister, I have a sister!”

As we drove off in her silver El Dorado Cadillac, I was dying with anticipation. I wanted to see what April looked like, hold her, and be one of the first voices she heard. Breaking the news that we would have to wait till morning before we could go to the hospital, Jeannie pulled out a bag of her just baked chocolate chip mandel bread. “They’re still warm,” she said, trying to comfort me.

Biting into the heavenly biscuits, still warm, with puddles of melted chocolate, my mood lifted.

When we arrived at her house, she led me to her secret freezer — “The Just In Case.” The just in case was hidden in the back of the basem*nt and it was only to be opened on very, very special occasions. It was stocked with decorative cookies and cakes that we feasted on. When my belly was full, she taught me how to measure, whip and separate eggs so we could re-stock for future festivities.

She also taught me the magic of transforming recipes using swaps from her bag of tricks, even though I never saw an actual bag. “If you are missing a couple of ingredients and can’t get to the store, or if you wanted to lighten the sugar, butter or dairy content in a recipe to make it a little healthier and a little more waistline friendly, I have all the tricks!” my aunt boasted. When I left Aunt Jeannie’s house, I not only had a new baby sister, butseveral baking secrets — many of which were top secret and could be used for baking desserts on nights that meat was served.

Recipe reprinted with permissionfrom“My Fat Dad, A Memoir, of Food Love and Family with Recipes”by Dawn Lerman.

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Chocolate Chip Mandel Bread Recipe | The Nosher (1)
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  • Total Time: 2 hours 25 minutes
  • Yield: 28 1x

Ingredients

UnitsScale

  • 3 cups of flour (plus more for kneading)
  • 1 ½ tsp aluminum-free baking powder
  • ¼ tsp of salt
  • 3 eggs, beaten
  • 1 cup sugar
  • 1 cup melted butter or oil
  • 2 tsp vanilla extract
  • 1 tsp almond extract or orange juice
  • ½ cup of chocolate chips, semi-sweet
  • butter, oil or parchment paper for the baking sheet

Instructions

  1. In a large bowl, mix together the flour, baking powder and salt and set aside. In another bowl, combine the beaten eggs and sugar until smooth. Whisk in the butter or oil, the vanilla extract and the almond extract or orange juice and then pour into the dry ingredients until in turns into dough. Then stir in the chocolate chips. Make into a large ball and chill in a glass bowl covered with plastic wrap in the refrigerator for 2 hours.
  2. Grease a baking sheet or cover with parchment paper and preheat oven to 350°F.
  3. Remove the dough from the refrigerator and wait 5 minutes so the dough is more pliable. Coat your hands with flour and remove the dough from the bowl. Knead the dough, and divide into two pieces. Form each piece into a roll about 3 inches wide. Place the rolls side by side onto the prepared baking sheet. They should stretch the length of the sheet.
  4. Bake 20 minutes at 350°F, until the rolls have started to turn brown. Then reduce the heat to 250°Fand bake for another 15 minutes.
  5. Remove the rolls from the oven onto a rack. Let cool about 10 minutes, until cool enough to handle. Then slice them diagonally about every ½ inch. Return the cookies to the baking sheet and lay them flat. Return to the oven and bake until lightly golden, about 30 minutes at 250°F. Allow to cool completely on a wire rack before serving. The cookies will get crunchier as they cool.
  • Author: Dawn Lerman
  • Prep Time: 20 minutes + 2 hours chill time
  • Cook Time: 1 hour 5 minutes
  • Category: Dessert
  • Method: Baking
  • Cuisine: Ashkenazi

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Chocolate Chip Mandel Bread Recipe | The Nosher (2024)

FAQs

What is the difference between biscotti and mandel bread? ›

Mandel Bread vs Biscotti

As mentioned above, mandel bread and Italian biscotti are very similar. There are two main differences: mandel bread is made with more fat than biscotti so the cookie has a bit richer flavor and isn't quite as dry, though it's still crunchy.

What is Mandel bread made of? ›

Ingredients. About 1 cup golden raisins, mini chocolate chips, and walnuts or a combination of the three (Malgieri's recipe calls for almonds, and no raisins or chocolate chips.) 1 teaspoon vanilla extract (Malgieri calls for a teaspoon of almond extract in addition to the vanilla extract, but I skip it.)

What is the history of Mandel bread? ›

Mandel bread, also called mandelbrot, is a type of cookie similar to the Italian biscotti and popular in Ashkenazi Jewish cuisine. The cookies were popular throughout the 19th century among Eastern European Jews, often consumed by rabbis, merchants and other Jewish community members.

What is another name for Mandelbrot? ›

Mandelbrot (Yiddish: מאַנדלברויט), with a number of variant spellings, and called mandel bread or kamish in English-speaking countries and kamishbrot in Ukraine, is a type of cookie found in Ashkenazi Jewish cuisine and popular amongst Eastern European Jews.

What do Italians call American biscotti? ›

Italians use the word biscotti when referring to products that Americans call cookies. The word cantucci is used by Italians when referring to the product Americans call biscotti.

What is the hardest bread to make in the world? ›

Little did I know that baguettes are considered the most difficult bread to bake, and “the art of artisan breads.” For the first six months, I baked three baguettes every day, generally wondering why anyone would go to all of the trouble.

What does Kamish mean in Yiddish? ›

But what does “kamish” mean? We asked a few Yiddish-speaking Bubbes, but they couldn't translate the word for us. They all knew that “brodt” is the Yiddish word for bread, so if you want to go old-school all Yiddish you say “mandelbrodt” and “kamishbrodt.” chocolate chunk, nicely browned.

Where did Mandelbrot cookies come from? ›

Mandelbrot means almond bread in Yiddish, but its origins are the biscotti cookies that were created in Italy over 700 years ago. These biscotti originally contained no fat or sugar and were baked twice so that they would be very hard and dry and last for months on ships at sea.

What does Mandelbrot mean in English? ›

mandelbrot (uncountable) A sort of cookie-like hard, sweet bread usually containing almonds traditionally eaten by Ashkenazi Jews and often dipped in tea.

What is the oldest bread in the world? ›

The find dates back to an impressive 6600 BC and was located at Catalhoyuk, an archaeological site in southern Turkey's Konya province. The bread residue was found near a partially destroyed oven structure in an area called "Mekan 66," surrounded by ancient mudbrick houses.

What is the holiest bread? ›

In the Holiness Code, the showbread is described as twelve cakes baked from fine flour, arranged in two rows on a table; each cake was to contain "two tenth parts of an ephah" of flour (Leviticus 24:5–6) (approximately 4.9 pounds).

What is the English name for biscotti? ›

cookie [noun] (American) a biscuit.

What's the difference between biscotti and cantucci? ›

The main difference between Cantucci and Biscotti is their origin, Cantucci is from Tuscany, and Biscotti is from the region of Emilia-Romagna. Cantucci is typically made with almonds, while Biscotti are made with all-purpose flour and a variety of nuts and chocolate or nothing.

What is the difference between American and Italian biscotti? ›

Biscotti can be either the traditional Italian type which is very crunchy and intended for dunking in coffee, tea, or wine. Or they can be the softer American type, eaten like any cookie. The Italian type keeps longer and has no butter, so they are much lower calorie and very low fat.

Is biscotti a bread or a cookie? ›

Biscotti is a sliced cookie made from a long piece of dough that has been baked, cut into individual pieces and finally re-baked to obtain characteristic texture and low moisture. The cookie is long and finger shaped.

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