shaun-in-to
Well-known member
I asked a cookbook author who uses a lot of ground nuts in her Italian desserts what the texture should be. I've always ground my own, using the smaller of two disks on an old hand-crank model. When I recently made her torta Caprese, the nuts had a certain chewiness or mealiness -- you knew they were there, and I wasn't sure that was what she'd intended.
She says the nuts should be finely ground like a flour. She recommends using a food processor but adding a bit of sugar (about 10% of what's called for in the recipe) to avoid making a nut butter.
I was in a good-quality Italian bulk store this morning, and their ground almonds were also fine, almost like flour, same as the supermarket packets, but those tend to be dry and flavourless.
Of course in many things it wouldn't really matter, like many cookies, or a tart pastry, and her almond macaroons, where I think the texture of the nuts is preferable. Now I'll have to make ANOTHER torta Caprese, just to see what the difference is. Isn't life hard ...
She says the nuts should be finely ground like a flour. She recommends using a food processor but adding a bit of sugar (about 10% of what's called for in the recipe) to avoid making a nut butter.
I was in a good-quality Italian bulk store this morning, and their ground almonds were also fine, almost like flour, same as the supermarket packets, but those tend to be dry and flavourless.
Of course in many things it wouldn't really matter, like many cookies, or a tart pastry, and her almond macaroons, where I think the texture of the nuts is preferable. Now I'll have to make ANOTHER torta Caprese, just to see what the difference is. Isn't life hard ...