Amaranth Florentines (v, gf)

Nutty, crunchy & lacy

I was playing around with amaranth as part of my recent focus on native ingredients and made Sean Sherman’s amaranth crackers, which are literally just cooked amaranth mixed with a little sunflower oil, spread on a pan and baked. I was intrigued by the binding quality of the amaranth (especially since I’ve been baking gluten-free) and I thought the texture and taste would complement the crunchiness of one of my favorite holiday cookies — the florentine.

A few iterations later, and I’m very happy with these crispy lacy crunchy cookies, that are just sweet enough to hold together and have a kind of toasty flavor that comes from the amaranth. My early batches included candied ginger in the dried fruit mix, which is wonderful with the dark chocolate, but slightly overpowers the nut and amaranth flavor, so I leave it up to you whether to include it.

This recipe is quick to come together aside from cooking the amaranth, which takes about 30 minutes. Instructions for cooking the amaranth are in the notes below — it’s hard to cook much less than ½ cup, which will give you more than you need, but you can eat it like any other grain. It’s also excellent as a breakfast porridge (serve it with some maple syrup, chopped nuts, and coconut flakes).

The recipe also makes a lot of cookies (you might have to bake them in two batches, depending on the size of your oven). You can halve the amounts if you want to get all the cookies in the oven at once, or you can freeze any leftovers for later.