Gnocchi of a Different Color

New York Times ^ | February 21, 2013 | MARK BITTMAN

[nickcarraway]

Variations on potato pasta, but all still ‘light as a cloud.’

A phrase often used (overused, really) to describe well-made gnocchi is "light as a cloud." It’s not an especially instructive description for a piece of real food, and for cooks hoping to try their hands at gnocchi for the first time, it can be downright daunting.

It’s true that gnocchi requires a bit of technique, but achieving that cloudlike texture — "light" is perhaps a simpler, less intimidating word — isn’t actually that difficult.

It’s all in the dough. There are just a few keys to remember: 1) Use starchy potatoes, like regular old russets (baking potatoes); nothing fancy. It’s the starch from the potatoes — along with the gluten from the flour — that holds the dough together.

Elaisha Stokes and Gabe Johnson/The New York Times Mario Batali shares his recipe for gnocchi with butternut squash with Mark Bittman. 2) You don’t want overcooked, waterlogged potatoes; the wetter they are, the more flour you’ll need. I bake them whole, which is effortless, but you could also boil them whole and unpeeled. If time allows, you might dry them out in a low oven for a little while, once they’re fully tender. 3) Use as little flour as you can get away with to make the dough hold its shape. Add the flour a little at a time, and test-boil a piece of dough — even if you think it’s not ready yet — to see if it holds together. 4) Be gentle when mixing and kneading; the idea is to avoid overdeveloping the gluten — which is the offense most likely to make your gnocchi decidedly un-cloudlike.

Another option is to add an egg, which makes success more likely but — and reasonable people disagree about this — makes

[nickcarraway]

[Eric in the Ozarks]

I made a big helping of pasta putanesca for dinner this evening.
Yum !

[deweyfrank]

Thanks for that. I also like Regatta Cheese Gnocchi. Not brave enough to try constructing them at home, but the ones I’ve bought at Philly’s Italian Market are fantastic.

[PghBaldy]

I made some old gnocci I found in my mom’s house. Probably a decade old. They were awful. Nearly destroyed the garbage disposal.

[nickcarraway]

I hope you learned a lesson from all this.

[nickcarraway]

I hope you learned a lesson from all this.

[Brad from Tennessee]

It's been a while since I've read something in the Times that's personally useful. I'm a pasta addict but I'm always looking for variations more nutritious than boiled flour and water. I like polenta but it's not sold around here, at least by name. I buy coarse ground yellow corn meal and boil that. The gnocchi I've had comes frozen. I didn't realize it was this simple to make. Thanks for the post.

[ZOOKER]

bfl