Authentic Italian Pizzelle Recipe

Delicate, crisp, and light, these beautiful and tasty Italian Waffle Cookies are known as Pizzelle. Anise is the most common Authentic Italian Pizzelle recipe flavor. However, I'll show you how to make lemon, cardamom, and chocolate pizzelle too!

I've been making this Authentic Italian Pizzelle Recipe ever since my friend Diane turned me on to them many years ago. Diane, whose husband is Italian, usually gives them out to friends for Christmas.

This year, I decided to crash Diane and Rick's pizzelle-making party. By the way, "Pizzelle" is pronounced "pitˈzell" in Italian. These cookies are also referred to as "Italian waffle cookies."

Although I own a pizzelle iron and know how to make them, I thought it would be more fun to make them with Rick and Diane. After many mishaps, we managed to make some chocolate pizzelle.

It turns out Diane can't talk and follow a recipe. We did manage to have some laughs though. Later, I experimented with a few other flavors on my own.

Why This Recipe Works

In order to make this Authentic Italian Pizzelles, you need a pizzelle waffle iron. A pizzelle recipe is usually included in the package.

Although I thought Diane had a "secret recipe" that was passed down from her Italian mother-in-law, I was wrong. In fact, Diane uses the recipe that came with her pizzelle maker (which looks ancient by the way).

My new pizzelle iron came with the same exact recipe. Furthermore, all the recipes I found online use the same basic recipe. The variation comes with the flavors/extracts added.

Although anise is the traditional flavor, there are other popular flavors like chocolate, almond, and vanilla.  For the record, I love the traditional anise flavor, but I'm excited to try some new flavors too!

What Goes Into This Recipe

Recipe Ingredient Notes

• Chocolate Pizzelle — The ingredients listed above are for anise Pizzelle. To make chocolate-flavored Pizzelle, you will also need to add ¼ cup cocoa powder, an additional ¼ cup sugar, and an additional ¼ teaspoon of baking powder.
• Cardamom — Cardamom is not traditionally added to anise Pizzelle. Feel free to leave it out.

How to Make Authentic Italian Pizzelle

1. Heat the pizzelle waffle iron, while you prepare the batter.

2. Whisk eggs, white sugar, butter, and anise extract in a large bowl. Sift in the flour, baking powder, and salt until the batter is smooth. 

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3. When the iron is ready to use, spray with non-tick cooking spray. Place one tablespoon of batter on each of the hot plates, and close the lid. A cookie scoop or melon baller works perfectly for this.

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4. Cook until hardly any steam is being produced, usually somewhere between 45 seconds to a minute.

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5. Some models have a light that goes from red to green as the Pizzelle cook and back to green a second time, indicating that the Pizzelle are ready.

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6. Use a fork or a thin spatula to remove the pizzelle to a wire rack to cool. Continue until the batter is all used up. 

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7. Cool Pizzelle completely, then sprinkle with powdered sugar.

8. Store the Pizzelle in your favorite jar, or tins for longer storage. This will help to retain their crispy textures.

Pizzelle Recipe Variations

This Authentic Italian Pizzelle Recipe can be altered to make various flavors.

To make cardamom pizzelle, replace the anise extract with 1 tablespoon vanilla extract, and 1 teaspoon cardamom.  

For lemon pizzelle, replace the anise extract with 1 tablespoon lemon juice, and the zest of one lemon.

After playing around with different variations, I've settled on my favorite; cardamom-anise walnut pizzelle. To make them, added 1 tsp. cardamom powder, 1 T. vanilla, 1 tsp. anise extract, and ⅓ cup ground walnuts.

I hope my Italian ancestors aren't rolling around in their graves with this crazy combination! You may want to start with this Pizzelle recipe but then experiment with your own favorite flavors.

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Recipe FAQs and Expert Tips

• Although I'd never considered adding nuts, Diane added chopped pecans to her chocolate batter and it was delicious. However, adding nuts to the mix does make the Pizzelle stick to the Pizzelle Iron more frequently.
• Pizzelle irons come in various sizes. This includes 3″ and 5". If I had it to do over again, I would have purchased the 5″ pizzelle iron.
• You can use Pizzelle to make Cannoli shells. To do this, you need to shape them when the pizzelle are warm (they become crisp as they cool off). Cannoli tubes or forms can be used to make the shells.
• Another tool that comes in handy is an ice cream cone mold. The molds are used to make pizzelle ice cream cones. Be sure to purchase the 5" pizzelle iron, instead of the 3" pizzelle iron, which would be too small to make cannoli shells and ice cream cones.
• Another idea would be to drape the soft pizzelle over an overturned small bowl. Once the pizzelle cool off and harden, they make an edible ice-cream bowl.
• Finally, you can use two pizzelle to make an ice-cream sandwich; Is that a great idea, or what?

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