Stella d’Oro Dietetic Egg Biscuits: first attempt

[catsittingstill]

There is a kind of biscuit that is wound through some of my earliest memories. A company called Stella d’Oro made something they called “Dietetic Egg Biscuits.” I am pretty sure Mom told me she used to give me one to gnaw on when I was teething. Certainly I remember them from early childhood; a donut shape (but with tiny regular bumps on the outside, like very blunt gear teeth) with a very smooth surface, very crunchy, with a dust-dry inside that absorbed my spit and turned soft in a couple of chews, very bland and slightly sweetish.

At some point when I was eight or nine Mom stopped buying them. It didn’t occur to me to pester her about it, and that was about the time we moved to the new house so maybe Mom just took to shopping at a different store, that didn’t have them.

I saw them again in my late 20s when I was visiting Mom and Dad in Oregon and shopping for something else there. I was glad to see them and bought several packages. That was the last time I saw them. I have not seen them for decades. On a whim last year I googled ”Dietetic Egg Biscuits” to see if I could order some, and discovered the death of the company. I mourned those biscuits.

A couple of days ago I googled again, hoping some other company had bought the recipe or something, and discovered that a food blogger named Preesi had the same craving I did, was more clever with the google or something, and had discovered that they seemed to be related to an Italian cookie called Taralli all’Uovo, or Egg Taralli. She linked to an Italian food blogger named Rosella who has a vlog called “Cooking with Nonna” and had one episode dedicated to making Egg Taralli.

The Egg Taralli are a different shape than the Dietetic Egg Biscuits and Preesi was not very clear at exactly what point she deviated from the Egg Taralli process, and I don’t possess a stand mixer, much less a pasta roller as called for in the vlog.

Here is what I tried this evening:

2 1/3 cups all purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
Whisk together dry ingredients
3 large eggs
2 Tablespoons olive oil
2 Tablespoons white wine

I mixed up the recipe in my bread mixer because I am a lazy creature and the prospect of mixing bread dough by hand for ten minutes and then rolling it out flat 20 times as described in the Egg Taralli vlog intimidates the daylights out of me.

Then I floured my cutting board and my rolling pin and rolled it out flat but about as thick as the cap of a 2 liter bottle. I used a cookie cutter that a housemate made for me literally 30 years ago, (thank you Bill-Bill!) to cut the outsides, and the cap of a 2 liter bottle to cut the insides to get an approximation of the donut shape. A recipe that should have made 18 Taralli made 9 DEBs (Dietetic Egg Biscuits) which seems about right.
I let them rest for 15 minutes and then put them in boiling water. It seems to take about 4 minutes for them to float to the top. They try to stick to the bottom at first so it is important to move them around a bit. When they do float to the top they come up edge first and I’m not sure if that counts so I waited mostly until they were flat on the surface.

I cut them with a knife all along the outside ring and the inside ring (as if I were trying to slice a biscuit in half to put butter and jam on it, but not all the way through) and then put them directly on the oven rack to bake.
They kept trying to fall through the rack so I think I need some kind of bake-able second rack with a smaller mesh, but I did eventually get them to stay. Turning them over was a bit of a challenge; tongs worked fine for it but I should have worn an oven mitt also because in my adventures with the falling DEBs I accidentally bumped the oven rack with the back of my hand and that stung a bit. PPE is not to be lightly set aside!
I baked them for 7 minutes at 475 degrees and then turned them over and swapped the ones in back for the ones in front because my oven does not heat evenly. I turned the heat down to 410 degrees and baked them 10 minutes more.

The texture is not quite right, mostly because it is a bit too damp inside. The outsides are only light brown so I could probably have baked a little longer. The taste is also not quite right; it should be a bit sweeter, I think. But I might give this another try in a bit.

Comments

[minoanmiss]

This is fun and fascinating reading!

[danceswithlife]

I remember Stella d'Oro cookies! I always got the variety boxes, so I probably tried the ones you liked. I'm sorry they are no longer in business. I'd buy some right away. Thanks for a good memory.