Neapolitan Spiced Cookies in Dark Chocolate

Sift the flour, cocoa and baking powder into a large bowl. Add the almonds, sugar, salt and all the cinnamon, nutmeg and cloves, then mix thoroughly. Add the honey, all 60 g juice, all the grated zest and 30 ml water. Mix with a spoon, then briefly by hand, just until the dough comes together. If it remains dry and cracks when squeezed, add the remaining water 1 tsp at a time, up to 30 ml. The dough should be pliable and slightly sticky while keeping its shape; do not knead it for long. Pour away any unused water.

Shape the dough into a flat block, wrap tightly and refrigerate for about 1 hour. Near the end of chilling, preheat the oven to 170°C on the conventional (no-fan) setting. Line two flat baking sheets, each with a usable area of at least 35 × 40 cm, with parchment paper. Divide the dough in half. Roll each half between two sheets of paper to an even thickness of about 8 mm. Keep the second half covered in the refrigerator while working on the first. Do not dust with additional flour.

Remove the top sheet of paper. Use a knife to cut diamonds about 8 cm long and about 6 cm wide. Gently gather the scraps and roll them out just once more to the same thickness; use all the dough. Make about 30 cookies in total and arrange about 15 on each baking sheet, leaving at least 2 cm between them. Keep the second sheet of raw cookies refrigerated while baking the first.

Bake one sheet at a time on the middle rack of the fully preheated oven for about 14–16 minutes. The surface should be matte and the edges should be set, while the center should still give slightly under gentle pressure, without wet raw dough. Do not wait for the cookies to harden in the oven. Leave them on the baking sheet for about 5 minutes, then transfer to a rack. Bake the second sheet in the same way; total baking time is about 30 minutes. Cool the last batch for about 40 minutes in total, including its rest on the baking sheet, until the bottoms are completely cool too. The first batch cools while the second bakes.

Chop all the chocolate and put it in a dry heatproof bowl. Set it over a pan with a little gently steaming water, making sure the bottom of the bowl does not touch the water. Stir for about 3–5 minutes, until the chocolate melts, then remove the bowl from the pan. Take care not to get water into the chocolate. Do not add oil or butter. Prepare flat trays lined with parchment paper that will fit in the refrigerator.

Coat only completely cold cookies. Dip each one in the chocolate, supporting it with a fork and using a spoon to help coat the top, bottom and sides thinly. Let the excess drip into the bowl, then place the cookie on the paper. Use the clean coating collected in the bowl for the remaining cookies; if it thickens, briefly melt it again over steam. Do not add extra to cookies that are already coated. Save any clean leftover chocolate separately for another use; it is not part of these servings.

Refrigerate the trays for about 30 minutes, until the coating sets and the cookies lift cleanly from the paper. Chill longer if it is still soft. Divide all the cookies into 15 servings of about two each. The centers should be dense and slightly soft; the melted chocolate coating sets through chilling.