Have you ever wondered what pignoli is in a recipe? Well they are nothing more than pine nuts. You see them in many cookies, meat, vegetables recipes, even mixed with chocolate, and especially in Italian cooking, but I wasn’t sure exactly what they were. There is even pine nut coffee. So I looked them up to see where these edible seeds came from, and it turns out they are part of a pine cone.
Not all pine cones are large enough to find them but if you have big enough cones, they make great additions to your recipes.
Now you may ask WHERE on the pine cone is this seed? Unless you are looking for it you might miss it. The seed actually is under each of the scales on a pine cone. About 20 kinds of pines produce seeds and the shells must be removed before you find the actual nut. So they are a bit of work to get to if you plan to try to collect some. It might be easier to buy them in the store. In the US the Native Americans usually have the exclusive rights to gather and sell these nuts, by the way.
In Europe the Stone Pine was grown and cultivated in the wild for over 6,000 years maybe even longer. They were know of and eaten as far back as the Paleolithic period of time, just for their use in cooking or eating. Some pines in Asia and North America are grown for this purpose also.
In the America you can find these seeds on four types of pin trees; they are the Colorado pinyon, Pinyon pine, Single leaf pinyon and the Mexican pinyon. Most other types of pine trees have the seeds but are really too small to even consider trying to gather seeds for cooking with or eating.
Below is recipe for a wonderful Italian cookie that is especially treasured at Christmas time. I hope you will try them as they are worth the effort and one of the best cookies you can make.
Italian Pignoli cookies (from Gourmet magazine)
For this particular recipe, it’s important to use canned almond paste – the type sold in tubes is too crumbly and doesn’t give the cookies the right consistency.
Preheat your oven to 350°F. It makes about 42 cookies.
2 (8-oz) cans almond paste (not marzipan), coarsely crumbled
1 1/2 cups confectioners sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 large egg whites
2 tablespoons mild honey
1 cup pine nuts (pignoli; 4 1/2 oz)
Pulse almond paste in a food processor until broken up into small bits, then add confectioners sugar and salt and continue to pulse until finely ground, about 1 minute.
Beat together almond mixture, egg whites, and honey in electric mixer at medium-high speed until smooth, about 5 minutes (batter will be very thick).
Spoon half of batter into pastry bag if using (keep remaining batter covered with a dampened paper towel) and pipe or spoon 1 1/2-inch rounds about 1 inch apart onto 2 parchment-lined baking sheets. Gently press half of pine nuts into tops of cookies.
Bake cookies in upper and lower thirds of oven, switching position of sheets halfway through baking, until golden, 12 to 15 minutes total. Slide cookies on parchment onto racks to cool completely, then peel cookies from parchment. Make more cookies with remaining batter and pine nuts on cooled baking sheets.
Have a nice holiday season and enjoy these great cookies.
