No Y chromosomes, please

Mom has been taking some of you to a cookie exchange with some of her Walton friends for years. Last year, Mom said I should go, and so I did for the first time. What Mom didn't tell me is that the cookie exchange has always been strictly for kids and Mom's women friends. Oops. I walked in to some hostile looks, and felt my testosterone level drop significantly. I made it through the evening, but didn't make the same mistake again when Mom invited me to this year's cookie exchange.

This beautiful little Italian cookie was one of the kinds Mom made and brought to the cookie exchange this time around. I saw these in a special collection of "Christmas Cookies" from the folks at America's Test Kitchen a few years ago, but hadn't gotten around to trying them yet. I flagged them as a good gluten-free option because the recipe's headnote says they are traditionally made with rice flour, but that they changed the formula to use all-purpose flour and some cornstarch because most people don't stock rice flour. Naturally, Mom didn't read the headnote ("details") and so didn't realize she could make these with the rice flour we are amply stocked up on. But that's okay, more of these yummy cookies for me until the text time we make them with rice flour. (David Lebovitz says that while his similar recipe "will work with regular white flour if that's what you have on hand," it's actually better with rice flour, which "gives the cookies a delightful crispness.")

The pastry chef at work

They look like little cookie hamburgers

Baci di Dama

Adapted from America's Test Kitchen

In Italy, these “lady’s kisses” are traditionally made with rice flour, which has the advantage of making them gluten free. If you don’t stock rice flour, you can substitute 70 grams (½ cup) all-purpose flour + 20 grams (2 tablespoons) cornstarch.

115 grams (1 cup) hazelnuts, toasted and skinned (I use Trader Joe’s Dry Roasted & Unsalted Oregon Hazelnuts)
90 grams rice flour (~¾ cup + 2 tablespoons Thai white rice flour) (see note)
50 grams (¼ cup) granulated sugar
¼ teaspoon fine sea salt
5 tablespoons (70 grams) unsalted butter, cut into ½-inch pieces and chilled
½ teaspoon vanilla extract
85 grams bittersweet chocolate, finely chopped, or chocolate chips (½ cup)

    1. Place racks in the middle two positions in the oven, and heat to 350 degrees. Line two 18-by-13-inch baking sheets with parchment paper or silicone liners.
    2. Place the hazelnuts, rice flour, sugar, and salt in the bowl of a food processor fitted with the steel blade. Process until everything is finely ground, about 30 seconds. Add the butter and vanilla, and process until the dough comes together, about 30 seconds more.
    3. Transfer the dough to a counter and divide into 4 equal pieces. Press and roll the first piece into a thick rope about 10 inches long by 1 inch wide. Use a bench scraper of a sharp knife to cut the rope into 20 pieces. Take your time—you want the pieces to be as even as possible, so the final cookies bake evenly and come out the same size. Roll each piece between your palms into little balls. Space the balls about 1 inch apart on a baking sheet. Repeat with the remaining dough. 
    4. Bake until the edges of the cookies are lightly browned, 16–18 minutes, rotating the sheets top to bottom and back to front halfway through baking. Transfer the sheets to wire racks, and let the cookies cool completely on the sheets.
    5. In a small bowl, microwave the chocolate or chocolate chips at 50% power, stirring every 30 seconds, until melted, 1–2 minutes total. Neatly dip one of the cookies into the chocolate, then top with another cookie, pressing lightly to hold them together. (You can also spread about ¼ teaspoon of chocolate onto each of the bottom cookies using an icing spatula or a piping bag.) Lay the sandwiched cookie on its side on a wire rack. Repeat with the remaining cookies. Let the chocolate set for at least 15 minutes before serving. Makes 40 sandwich cookies.