Ossi dei Morti – Italian bone cookies for Day of the Dead

We love making special food for the holidays, and foods for Halloween/ Day of the Dead tend to have a bit of a macabre bent, which is always fun! Many foods for these holidays feature bones, skulls or similar shapes, and we are always interested to see how this is even true across cultures. Pan de Muerto from Mexico is topped with mini dough bones, and we recently discovered an Italian cookie that is all bones – the “ossi dei morti/ossa dei morti” – bones of the dead. The “Ossi” are like biscotti, and are flavored with almond and cinnamon/clove. Though this cookie is from the region of Piedmont north of Italy, it is found throughout the country. Good Food Stories has a good-looking recipe, as does Passion and Cooking which includes hazelnuts and a slightly less macabre shape.

Ossi dei Morti in Philadelphia by cherdt