Little Cheesy Pillows of Love…

Tonight was ricotta gnocchi night.  I had been thinking about cooking this all day.  It was a little time consuming, but overall it was easy and the results were delicious!  The recipe is from “Cook’s Illustrated” magazine, the Sept/Oct 2007 issue.

I started by making the really simple sauce….

1 Tbsp. olive oil

1 clove garlic, finely minced

1 can (14.5 ounces) of diced tomatoes pureed in the food processor

1/4 tsp. salt

1 Tbsp. sugar

2 Tbsp. finely chopped basil

2 Tbsp. finely chopped parsley

2 Tbsp. heavy cream (I used half n half)

You basically cook the garlic in the oil for about 20 seconds, then add the pureed tomatoes, salt and sugar.  Let it simmer for about 5 minutes, then yank it off the heat and stir in the herbage and the cream.  I put it aside in a bowl and covered it with foil because I needed the skillet to saute the cooked gnocchi before I served it.  The sauce ended up looking like this:

Actually, I lied. The first thing I did was take a 16oz container of whole milk ricotta and put it in a strainer over a bowl in the fridge for an hour to drain out excess moisture. Then, I put 2 pieces of white bread in the food processor and made breadcrumbs, which I then dry toasted on a sheet pan in a 300 degree oven for 10 minutes. Then, I assembled the ingredients for the gnocchi.

In a large bowl I mixed the drained ricotta, one egg, 2 Tbsp. chopped basil and 2 Tbsp. chopped parsley. Then I added 6 Tbsp. of flour, half a cup of grated parmesan cheese and the bread crumbs I made earlier. I added a little salt and pepper. It looked like this:

After the dough was mixed, I shoved it in the fridge for 15 minutes while I washed all the dishes. After I took the dough out, I took lemon-sized handfuls and began CAREFULLY rolling them into snakes about maybe an inch in diameter. I put my knife on the counter to serve as some kind of context.

You have to keep the surface lightly floured, because the dough is pretty wet and sticky. Anyway, after rolling the dough into a snake, I cut it in pieces around 3/4 of an inch long. I put the pieces on a cookie sheet lined with parchment until I had finished cutting all of the gnocchi.

I brought a big pot of water to a boil, knocked it back to a simmer and cooked half the gnocchi at a time. You wait until they float to the top, then let them cook for 2 minutes. After they were all cooked, I put them in a non-stick skillet with some heated butter and let them sit until they had some color, about 5 minutes. Then I poured the sauce over them, let it heat through, and poured it into big bowls.

This was a very successful experiment. The gnocchi had a very soft, cheesy texture. And the sauce was simple and clean. I will definitely do this again. You can double it and freeze the gnocchi before you boil them. When you are ready to use, defrost in the fridge and saute in some butter.