How To Make: Gnocchi

The other day I asked my boyfriend to pick up potatoes at the store to go with our steak dinner. I should have specified I only needed 4 potatoes, because what we ended up with was a 10 lb. bag of potatoes that could feed a family for a month! Men are funny. Needless to say, we have been eating A LOT of potatoes lately. I usually just slice the potatoes thinly, then cover them in a mixture of olive oil, season salt, and black pepper and bake them at a high temp in the oven to make crispy potatoes. The potatoes “fries” (see our Oven Baked 'French Fries' recipe) make the perfect side dish to just about anything!

But there does come a point when you have just had enough potato “fries”. I decided to go totally outside my kitchen comfort zone and try a new recipe using potatoes… and I made GNOCCHI!!! For those of you who are not familiar with Italian food, gnocchi are dumplings made from potatoes. They can also be made from made from semolina, ordinary wheat flour, egg, cheese, breadcrumbs, or similar ingredients. These classic Italian dumplings are an alternative to pasta and are quite delicious!

I’ve enjoyed many gnocchi dishes at restaurants and even bought pre-made gnocchi at the grocery store, but I had no idea how the dumplings were made or what they were made out of (besides potato). Well, after some research I found an easy recipe on allrecipes.com that requires only 3 ingredients!!!! If you have 1) potatoes 2) flour and 3) an egg you can make gnocchi. I had no idea it was so simple.

I will admit it is a labor of love to make these potato dumplings, but totally worth the time and effort! I followed the recipe and directions to the T… and quite honestly the only thing I would do differently next time is add a little salt to the dough. These gnocchi turned out great! I threw them in with some chicken sausage, broccoli, olive oil and Parmesan cheese and created a yummy, healthy one-dish meal.

Gnocchi

recipe via allrecipes.com

makes about 4 servings

Ingredients:

• 2 potatoes
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 egg

Directions:
Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Peel potatoes and add to pot. Cook until tender but still firm, about 15 minutes.

Drain, cool and mash with a fork or potato masher.

Combine 1 cup mashed potato, flour and egg in a large bowl.

Knead until dough forms a ball.

Shape small portions of the dough into long "snakes". On a floured surface, cut snakes into half-inch pieces.

Bring a large pot of lightly salted water to a boil. Drop in gnocchi and cook for 3 to 5 minutes or until gnocchi have risen to the top; drain and serve.

At this point, I added the gnocchi to some cooked chicken sausage and broccoli. Tossed it all in a warm pan in olive oil and Parmesan cheese. Then sprinkled with red pepper flakes!

You can eat gnocchi plain.... or throw them into a pan with your favorite meats, vegetables, and pasta sauces to make a hearty, delicious 'pasta' dish! There are plenty of awesome recipes out there for dishes using your homemade gnocchi.

Yuuuuuuuummmmmmmm!

I can't wait to try making gnocchi again, there are so many different ways to prepare and eat it!

Yeay for trying new things! It's fun to experiment and make a mess in the kitchen from time to time...

Good luck on your gnocchi-making adventure.

- Janel