In Tuscany, where arguably the most famous biscotti come from, you can find a few types of similar cookies. The most well-known are cantuccini, which are often almond-studded biscotti from Prato, Florence's neighboring city. There are also tozzetti, which can be found in the Etruscan areas of Tuscany's deep south that border Lazio; these cookies sneak in from the province of Viterbo. Finally, there are numerous variations that can be found here and there—like the cantuccini gigliesi from the island of Giglio, where bakeries sell long flat logs of dried fig and dark chocolate filled cantuccini to take home for chopping up. <br /> <br />I usually make cantuccini with almonds, whole, raw and unpeeled, and a splash of vin santo added to the mixture. But now that I live in southern Tuscany, which is closer to Rome than Florence—where it's more common to see hazelnut tozzetti than cantuccini—I've broken my own rules and morphed the recipes together for something that's like cantuccini but with the distinct hazelnuts of tozzetti. <br /> <br />If vin santo isn't available, you can use anything to replace it—any other wine, grappa, sambuca (that anise flavor is quite typical of traditional biscotti); or, if you don't have alcohol, use a splash of water.

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