Baci di Stresa

Those romantic Italians... They know all about kisses. And for the festa di Santo Valentino, Valentine's Day, Stresiani don't need to look any further than right outside their doors for a romantic gift, because they have their very own type of kisses right here, the Baci di Stresa. The Baci di Stresa cookie can be found in any pastry shop in Stresa, but this simple recipe is also easy to make at home. Here are the ingredients:

100 g. of flour
100 g. sugar
100 g. ground hazlenuts
80 g. softened butter

Even without doing the grams to ounces conversion you can see this is easy to do because it uses equal amounts of all, and just 20% less of the butter. So make as many as you want.

Mix all the ingredients together, roll into a tube shape and wrap the tube in plastic, then let the dough chill in the refrigerator for two hours.

After two hours, cut small pieces from the dough and roll it into 1" diameter balls. Place the balls on a greased cookie sheet or baking paper. Bake for 25 minutes at 160 C. (325 F) The cookies will flatten out during baking.

Allora, when the cookies have cooled melt some dark baking chocolate in a double boiler, and use a small amount of chocolate to bond together two cookies.

As if they are bonded in a kiss...

Happy Valentine's Day a tutti...

This photo was taken in Verbania, and I suppose that's why they didn't use the Baci di Stresa name. However, there are the traditional Baci di Stresa on the left, and other variations on the right. Wherever the kiss is from is nice after all...