A bergamot orange is a citrus fruit that looks like a hybrid between an orange and a lemon. Chances are you’ve never seen one before. I certainly hadn’t. Chances are also that you do know what bergamot oil tastes or smells like, because this oil (that is obtained from the skin) is what lends its flavor to Earl Grey tea. I don’t drink a lot of tea, but Earl Grey is one of my favorites. So when I saw bergamots for sale, I decided to buy one and try to make something with it. After some thought, I decided on cookies. They turned out quite nice with a nice and fresh recognizable Earl Grey/bergamot taste and smell, and it is no surprise they are good with a nice glass of Earl Grey tea. I suppose you could make the same cookies using different citrus fruits if you can’t find bergamot oranges.
Ingredients
For 1 baking sheet of cookies
275 grams (1 3/4 cups) flour
175 grams (1 1/2 sticks) butter
75 grams (1/4 cup) corn starch or potato starch
50 grams (1/4 cup) sugar
grated zest and juice of 1 bergamot orange
pinch of salt
Preparation
Preheat the oven to 175/350F.
Put the diced butter, sugar, juice, salt, and zest into the food processor fitted with a metal blade.
Process until creamy.
Add the flour and corn starch and process until you obtain a dough.
Roll this out to the size of your baking sheet, about 3 mm (1/8 inch).
Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and put the cookies on it. I was lazy since this was an experiment and just cut up the sheet of cookie dough with a knife. You could of course also make nice shapes with a cookie cutter or a glass or whatever.
Bake them for 15-20 minutes until slightly golden. Let them cool and store in an airtight container.
You could eat them as is…
…or sprinkled with confectioner’s sugar if you like them sweeter.
Stefan's Gourmet Blog 
This is the first time I’ve ever seen a bergamot fruit. Honestly, I’m not even sure I knew it was a fruit!
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Ditto!
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I’ve only known for a few years that Earl Grey tea is made from bergamot oil and that bergamot oil comes from the bergamot orange. This was the first time I ever saw one, that’s why I just had to buy it. If you smell the fruit, it has a fresh citrus scent mixed with ‘Earl Grey’.
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A nice addition to any citrus cookies (or any citrus dessert for that matter) is some grated zest. Bergamots can still be found in Sicily but you were pretty lucky to spot them at a market!
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Agree completely on adding citrus zest, even to desserts that are not citrus desserts per se.
It was not just at a random market by the way, but at a wholesale place where restaurants by their ingredients.
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