Spinach Ricotta Gnocchi

I've been on a gnocchi kick lately. These were very good. LOVED the spinach in them. I made the recipe a bit healthier by using part skim ricotta and whole wheat flour. I also served it with broccoli mixed in. Loved the simplicity of the sauce that really let the gnocchi dominate. This was really pretty easy and the only time consuming part was forming the gnocchi. But, well worth it!

Spinach Ricotta Gnocchi
Simplyrecipes.com

Gnocchi

• 3 ounces fresh or frozen spinach


• 1 egg


• 2 teaspoons salt


• 1 1/2 pounds part skim ricotta cheese, drained of excess moisture


• 1/3 cup finely grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese


• 1 3/4 cups whole wheat flour


• Pinch of nutmeg

Sauce

• 1 28-ounce can crushed tomatoes (or whole tomatoes that you shred as you add to the pan)


• 4 Tbsp olive oil


• 2 garlic cloves, peeled


• Salt

Gnocchi

1 Fill a medium saucepan halfway with water and heat until simmering. Add spinach and cook until tender, about 1 minute. Drain. Let spinach cool enough to touch, then squeeze as much moisture as you can out of it. You can also use a potato ricer if you have one to squeeze the excess moisture out of the spinach.

2 Add the spinach, egg, salt, and half of the ricotta to a food processor. Pulse until completely blended. Transfer mixture to a large bowl, mix in the remaining ricotta and the Parmesan cheese. Stir a pinch of nutmeg into the flour. Add the flour in by hand, starting with a half of the flour. Mix everything with your hands until the mixture holds together as a dough.

3 Put the dough out on a lightly floured smooth, clean surface. Knead lightly for about a minute, adding additional flour if needed, if the dough sticks too easily to the board or your hands. (At this point, if you wrap the dough in plastic and refrigerate for an hour, it will be easier to roll out.) When the dough is smooth and pliable, and still just a little bit sticky, divide it into 4 portions, each the size of an orange.

4 Flour your hands lightly. Using both hands, and a light touch, roll the dough out with a back and forth motion, starting at the center and stretching the dough out, to form a roll. This is the tricky part. You don't want to put so much pressure so that you compress the dough, but you do need enough pressure to create a rope of dough. The trick is to stretch the dough sideways as you are rolling. Once the segment you are working on gets to be about a foot long, you may find it easier to cut it in half, and then start working on that smaller segment.

Roll the dough out until the roll is about the size of a middle finger. (Note that if your hands or the board is a little too floured, you may not have enough traction between your skin and the dough to easily stretch it sideways.) Cut each roll into 1-inch pieces.

5 Hold a fork at a 45% angle with its tines facing down on the work board, the curved part of the fork facing away from you. Starting with the curved outside bottom of the fork, press each piece of dough up along the length of the tines. Let the gnocchi fall back down. This is a pretty quick motion, the result is an indentation of the fork tines on one side of the gnocchi, and an indentation of your fingertip on the other side.

I just squeezed a small indent in the middle of the gnocchi without making the fork indentations. Its worked well for me in the past and, well, if its not broke, don't fix it!

Place the gnocchi on a lightly floured cookie sheet. At this point they can be cooked, or kept in the refrigerator several hours or overnight.

5 To cook the gnocchi, fill a large wide pot half-way with water. Bring to a boil, add 1 teaspoon of salt for every quart of water. Once the salt has dissolved, gently drop the gnocchi in the water, one by one. Try to do this in a way that the gnocchi are not falling in on top of each other, but rest on the bottom of the pan in a single layer. As the gnocchi cooks, they will rise to the surface of the water after a couple minutes. Use a slotted spoon to remove the risen gnocchi from the pot, place in a serving bowl. As you remove the gnocchi, add more to the pan.

The Sauce

1 Heat oil in a medium saucepan on medium heat. Add the garlic cloves and cook until lightly browned on all sides. Remove and discard the garlic. Add the tomatoes (include any juices from the can) all at once (careful, they may cause the oil to splatter as the tomatoes hit the pan). As soon as the mixture boils, reduce the heat to low and let simmer, uncovered for 10 to 15 minutes. Season with salt. Stir occasionally. Use a potato masher to break up any solid pieces of tomato, you want a rough purée.

2 Once the sauce reduces to a medium thick consistency, add the goat cheese, stirring until it is well blended. Add more salt to taste.

Serve gnocchi with the sauce and extra grated Parmesan. Serves 4-6.

Pumpkin Gnocchi with Sage Butter

I've been talking about Gnocchi for awhile now. I was begging Spice to make it for me, but she hasn't gotten around to it yet. When I was home for Christmas, however, LadyJayPee pulled out an article in the Seattle Times for Pumpkin Gnocchi with Sage Butter and with a few pumpkins still fresh from her garden, I knew what my dinner project was going to be!



This was no doubt a time-consuming project, but SOOOO much fun! And the finished product...WHOOOO! Boy! Have I been missing out on the gnocchi train!



Although I followed the recipe this time, next time I will make pumpkin puree the "easy" way, by cutting the pumpkin in half and baking before scraping out the insides and pureeing it in a food processor. I also drained the puree a bit through a strainer to remove the access liquid. 

My pumpkin was approximately 3 lbs instead of the recommended 1 1/2. It still worked out perfectly though!



According to Atkinson, pressing the gnocchi dough into simple discs that are thinner in the center than around the edges allows them to cook evenly, like the hole in a doughnut. Many other versions are made by rubbing the gnocchi against the tines of a fork to create shell-like nuggets.

Pumpkin Gnocchi with Sage Butter
From The Seattle Times, Greg Atkinson

For the Gnocchi:
1 1/2 lbs fresh pie (sugar) pumpkin, peeled and cut into 1-inch cubes
2 tablespoons butter
1 to 2 cups unbleached, all-purpose flour, divided
1/2 cup whole wheat flour
1 large egg yolk
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper, or to taste
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground nutmeg, or to taste

For the sage butter:
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter
24 fresh sage leaves

For the garnish:
2 ounces parmesan cheese
Freshly ground black pepper, to taste 

1. Pile the pumpkin cubes onto a rack over a cup of water in a medium-size saucepan. Steam over medium-high heat until the pumpkin is soft and tender, about 10 minutes. Lift the rack from the saucepan, discard the cooking water and allow the pumpkin to cool to room temperature. 

2. Force the steamed pumpkin through a food mill or press it through the holes of a colander. Put the puree back in the pan and stir in the 2 tablespoons of butter. Cook over low heat, stirring frequently, until the pumpkin has thickened and dried, about 10 minutes.

3. Remove the pan from the heat and when the pumpkin puree has cooled almost to room temperature, stir in a cup of the flour, the egg yolk, salt, pepper and nutmeg. You should have a very sticky dough. Stir in another half cup of flour, then sprinkle the remaining flour onto a clean, dry surface and scrape the dough onto the flour. Knead the mixture gently, incorporating just enough flour to make a soft dough.

4. To form the gnocchi, divide the dough into 8 pieces. Roll each piece of dough into a rope about an inch thick and cut the rope into 12 pieces. Gently pinch each piece of dough with a well-floured thumb and forefinger to make a concave dumpling. Place the formed gnocchi in a single layer on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. If you're not going to cook them immediately, cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate the gnocchi for up to 4 hours or freeze them for several days.

5. When you're ready to cook the gnocchi, bring a gallon of water with a tablespoon of salt to a boil. Cook the gnocchi in several batches (I did about 15 at a time) in the boiling water until they rise to the surface of the water, about 3 minutes. Life the gnocchi out of the water with a slotted spoon and hold them on a warm platter. Toss with gnocchi with the butter sauce. Use a vegetable peeler to cut curls of Parmesan over the top of the dish and top with a few grinds of fresh pepper.

6. To make the butter sauce, melt the butter in a small skillet over low heat. Add the sage leaves and simmer until the butter turns golden.