A delicious Italian Cookie, these Chocolate Canestrelli are crunchy, buttery with a delicious taste of chocolate. Perfect as a snack with a cup of tea.
Place eggs in a pot and cover with cold water, heat until boiling, then remove from heat and let sit 8-10 minutes. Place under cold water. Remove the shell and white part of the eggs, let the hard boiled yolks cool then mash very well with a fork.
Sift together the flour, sugar, salt, corn starch and cocoa into the bowl of your food processor, add the cold cut up butter and pulse a few times until you have coarse crumbs.
Add the mashed cooled egg yolks and pulse until the dough almost comes together. Move to a flat surface and gently knead into a compact smooth dough. Wrap in plastic and refrigerate for 1-2 hours or even over night.
Pre-heat oven to 335° (170° celsius). Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper.
Remove the dough from the fridge, on a lightly floured flat surface, start with rolling out half the dough to 1/3 inch (1 cm) thickness and cut with a small size flower cookie cutter, using a straw or any small round hole cutter (1-1½ inches/2½-3½ cm), cut a hole in the middle of the flower.
Place the cut out cookies on the prepared baking sheets and bake for approximately 10-12 minutes, cookies should not brown. Let cookies rest 5 minutes then move to wire racks to cool completely, dust with powdered sugar before serving if desired. Enjoy!
Notes
If you don't have a food processor you can make the dough by hand or with a stand mixer, but on low speed. The cookies can be kept in an airtight container for up to 2 weeks, if your home is too warm I would advise refrigerating them. You can also freeze them in a freezer safe bag or container for up to 3 months.