Cream together butter and sugar. Add eggs one at a time, beating after each addition and reserving one yolk. Add flour, salt, and baking powder. Mix well at medium speed of electric mixer.
Form dough into flattened log shapes or domed loaves, 2 inches wide by one half-inch high in the center.
Beat together remaining yolk and 1 tablespoon of milk. Brush over tops.
Bake in a preheated 375°F oven 20 minutes. When cool enough to handle, use a serrated knife to slice diagonally into 1 1/4" thick slices. Place on a baking sheet and toast five minutes. Note: You may save the slice-and-toast step until the next day.
Note: You may substitute anisette liquor for the extract, by increasing to 1 tablespoon.
This cookie is an old Italian family favorite from my mother's recipe box. As a child, I enjoyed dunking them in a coffee cup filled with cold milk while the adults around me had their cups filled with espresso.
There is an art to timing the dunking process. If not long enough, the milk or coffee will just sit on the surface - too long, and the toast will begin to fall apart.
Somewhere between those two extremes, the cookie will just be moistened to perfection and the anisette flavor will bloom.
And for the finale, the milk that remains in the dunking cup is now anise-flavored, so that when the last toast is but a crumb, the dunking liquid is good till the final drop.
Submitted by: CM
