I don't have a recipe, but I suggest researching some on youtube, it really helps to watch to see the techniques on something like this. It may also help steer you to the right recipe/type, since there are different ways to make them.

Good luck!

Christine

I have made this recipe from Fine Cooking and we enjoyed it. I also prefer shaping them like this. In the magazine, there was a sausage and leek ragu to go with it that was good as well and can likely be found on their site.

Here is a link that might be useful: Potato Gnocchi

Interesting that Tishtoshnm prefers the chopped rope version. It's faster and easier for sure, but I was just about to say that I love the fork quenelle. the reason for the ridges is so that they hold the sauce. There's also a device, as in the pictures in this blog. Saying that, I don't actually make them. Once was enough. :) But they're good eating. :)

The lead lumps you disdain are probably overworked, and/or have too much flour. There are lots of pictures of people handling the dough like Playdoh. Not a good idea. It should be handled only slightly and lightly, not rolled back and forth, if it's going to stay light. Also, mashing them while cutting can seal the edges. Sharp is better.

Edit:
Lidia B. has great tips on her blog.

This post was edited by plllog on Wed, Jan 7, 15 at 1:12

This is a tried and good recipe.
For 4 to 6 people :
1 kg floury potatoes
200g flour

Peel and cook the potatoes - boil or steam. Mash them, then add 3/4 of the flour with a wooden spoon. Gently knead in the rest by hand.

Roll out long sausages, cut into sections then run each along the tines of a fork to make the ridges.

Pllog is right - work the mix as little as possible.
It's oe of these things that depends a lot on your potatoes. You may find that you need less flour. Less is always better.

Boil for about 2 minutes - until they come to the surface of the pot then scoop them up to drain. Cook in batches.
Delicious with a simple tomato sauce and parmesan.

There are different types of gnocchi to try such as pumpkin. You can add an egg or 2 which makes them easier to make, but they will be tougher. You can add fresh herbs. Make them with carrots, or spinach and ricotta added too. Parsnips.....

My favorite gnocchi video is from The Godfather 3!

Woohoo just ordered another gadget that I'll use once, if I'm motivated. At least it's small and cheap this time!

I don't make these myself, but I have a good friend who is a chef from Italy. His gnocchi were always very good, but when his brother (also a chef) came to visit him from Italy, his gnocchi were absolutely amazing.

My friend discovered that the difference was that he was putting in as much flour as the recipes call for, while his brother did everything else, then added only as much flour as absolutely necessary for it to stick together.

So the secret would seem to be the least possible amount of flour.

Thank you for responses so far. I'm eager to have time to spend time looking through links and videos.

What a warm and hearty meal it would be on a day like this!

I looked to see what CI had to say about gnocchi in their "Italian Classics" cookbook. They had a lot to say. More than normal.

Amck - or anyone - I could send you phone pics of 5 pages of discussion and recipe if you'd like, just email me thru GW.

Here are some key points:

- No more flour than you need, but don't skimp, either.

- Lower moisture in potatoes is better. Their preferred cooking method, from favorite to least favorite: baking, steaming (skin on or off), boiled skin on, boiled skin off.

- Using a ricer has the smoothest results.

- Let the potatoes steam a bit after mashing (ricing), to get rid of more moisture.

- Work the dough by hand, minimally.

- They preferred no egg.

- Indentation with your index finger makes for more even cooking.

- Use starchy potatoes, russet or baking

The chicken gnocchi soup at Olive Garden is my favorite thing to get there. It was a coincidence to see your post this evening because on our way home from the VA hospital this afternoon, we stopped there and that is what I had. Our temps were in the low single digits and the wind chill was -13 so that soup was so warm and comforting. I will be working on making it here at home.

If you do not have a ricer, you can grate the cooked potato on a box grater. I always add an egg when I make it, and I mix it by hand (with fingers) in a bowl and then turn it out to knead the dough a few turns. My recipe is very similar to Tishtoshnm's.

Lars

Not really what you are looking for but what a great recipe in my link below...
We have made gnocchi a dozen times...or more over the years.
For special, i make the parisian. Might be an interest to see the recipe...and a few good y-tube videos available to see the process.

Here is a link that might be useful: gnocchi parisian

Sleevendog, those look great - that's Sunday dinner sorted!!!

I agree, they do look great. I may have to try them with gluten free choux paste as well and see how that comes out. They may be going on the menu for next week.

I was talking to a chef yesterday about the Parisian gnocchi as I'd never heard of them - she says they're heavy compared to potato ones. Do you find this?

IC, did you look at the recipe? If made right, the choux paste should puff up. Not as much as if baked dry, but in Kenji's picture, there were good sized holes and it looked fluffy (even the dense one next to it looked pretty light). Potato gnocchi if made right are silken pillows of fluff, but they don't have the big holes. They're more creamy textured. It may be that the chef you spoke to was thinking of a different recipe.

No, not heavy at all. Also quite light when 'fished' out of the water bath...
The second baking/roasting/toasting in a single layer in a dish, (i used single serving small stainless platters), gives a good puffing and slight top crust...
I did watch a restaurant chef video that was very helpful...
I'll see if i can find it.
Or a link to when i made them about this time last year...

Watching a video does help....i used two...Thomas Keller and this one,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zUjhPUTZA18
(very awkward hostess, : )

(Keller finishes the gnocchi in second video using mushrooms and squash.

Found the pic of mine...

Here is a link that might be useful: Thomas Keller cooks gnocchi

Thank you. I think they look wonderful. Deffo going to try.

I started making gnocchi yesterday after work, and there was not enough time to finish them before dinnertime, and so I have stored the dough in the fridge without making the ropes or gnocchi pieces. I could not find my box grater (I guess I no longer have one!), and so I pushed the potatoes through a large mesh skimmer that is almost too large for me to use in any of my stock pots, but it worked well as a substitute for a ricer.

When I bought the russet potatoes at the market last week-end, I could not remember why I was buying them, and so I got ones that were way too huge - about 1# 5 oz each. I wanted to use two pounds of potatoes, and so I used one russet and one Yukon gold potato that weighed 9 oz. I steamed the potatoes in my pressure cooker, and they came out fairly dry, but I did let them cool a bit before I "riced" them, and then let that cool also before adding one egg and some salt. I also added almost two cups of flour and very gently mixed the dough with my hands until it began to come together - it reminded me of pie dough. Then I turned it out on a board, pulled the dough together, and then stored it in a plastic bag, as it was already 7:30 by then. I made burritos for dinner last night and will finish making the gnocchi tonight and have with a kale salad that Kevin requested. I haven't made kale salad before and might make a Caesar dressing for it - or else a simple vinaigrette.

When I've made gnocchi before, I started much earlier in the day and had forgotten how long it took, even though the potatoes cooked very quickly in the pressure cooker. I have a rack that fits inside my PC that allows me to use it as a steamer, and I am not sure whether that came with the PC or not, but it fits perfectly, and so I am guessing that it did.

Now I am wondering if I should break down and buy a potato ricer.

Lars

Lars, I recently bought a new potato masher and it works about as well as a ricer. It was Jamie Oliver on Amazon and works fabulously. Below is a link to my favorite kale salad on 101 cookbooks. The one thing I do differently is to use chopped walnuts instead of bread crumbs but I imagine either way is good. Sometimes we use feta instead of parmesan as well.

Here is a link that might be useful: Raw Tuscan Kale Salad

Thanks for the salad recipe - I printed it out and will make it this evening. I may have to use Parmesan instead of Pecorino, as I do not normally keep that on hand. I do have Bulgarian feta, however. I often make a salad dressing starting with garlic clove plus kosher salt in a mortar & pestle. I have my own dried cayenne chilies that I can mince into flakes as well. I like the use of bread crumbs instead of croutons - much easier to make!

Lars

I have a french potato ricer and don't know how I managed before having one (thank you AnnT). I've had it for about 4 years or so.
In addition to ricing potatoes, it is excellent for squeezing water out of vegetables, such as zucchini.
I consider a ricer as important as other heavily used utensils.
This is the one I bought but I only paid about 25 for it.

Here is a link that might be useful: Ricer

Okay, I'm sold on the ricer now - but mainly because the description said that it can be used for mashing fruits, which I would use it for and not only potatoes, making it seem worth the space it will take up. Also, it occurred to me that I could use it with grilled chilies, and I think it might work better for that than the food mill that I have.

Thanks for the link!

Lars

First let me say that storing the dough overnight is NOT a good idea, although I was still able to work with it. It seemed to have even more moisture, and I had to add quite a bit of flour to make it workable. Also, I learned that you have to store each gnoccho separately - if they touch each other before being boiled, they glue themselves together. Some of mine did that, and so I ended up forming them with a spoon and treating them as dumpling. They reminded me a bit of matzo balls, but that was okay.

After I boiled them, I put them in pasta bowls and microwaved those to make sure they were done. Then I put grated Asiago cheese on that (it looks like bits of linguine in the photo) and then put tomato sauce over that. All in all, it was a laborious process, and I still have half of the dough in the fridge, for future use.

I absolutely loved the kale salad and will make that again! I used Parmesan cheese and instead of lemon juice, I used a teaspoon of aged Balsamic vinegar (for sweetness) and 2 Tbsp of white Balsamic (for tartness). I increased the amount of garlic, and I used three cayenne chilies, seeded and minced, which I added to the garlic/salt paste in the mortar. I did not add black pepper, as the cayenne gave it just the right amount of heat. I used a very good olive oil (that I bought in Paso Robles), and that made a big difference. This is now one of my favorite salads! It is so much easier to make bread crumbs instead of croutons, and I used whole wheat bread that I baked myself for the crumbs. Kevin said he's had this same salad in Culver City but the restaurant sometimes adds broccoli and tomatoes to it! He thinks it is better without the broccoli, and he tells the restaurant to leave the tomatoes out!

When I made gnocchi before, I made a smaller batch. They were a bit better this time, as I was more careful with the dough, heeding the warnings in this thread. While my potatoes were fairly dry, I do think that baked potatoes would work better. However, steamed potatoes were extremely easy to peel, once they cooled. The skins came off like very thin paper with no potato loss.

Thanks again for the kale salad recipe!

Lars

I am so very glad you enjoyed the salad. I make it about once a month during kale season to eat for lunches, since kale holds better already dressed than lettuce does.

I thought I did not need a ricer as my potato masher seems to do the job just as well but after Bbz mentioned that she uses it for zucchini, now I do need it. My amazon wish list just keeps growing and growing.

Lars, your dinner looks scrumptious! Your prep notes underscore that I should wait for a free day before tackling gnocchi for the first time. But these posts make me want to try it soon.

Odds are, I'll get to the kale salad recipe first. What a bonus find in this thread!

That looks tasty, Lars!

Tish, I use it all summer for grated zucchini, which I typically use in zucchini latkes or anything using grated zucchini.
I am sure there are a lot of things it would work well on but I am not a very adventurous cook. I get stuck on a few things I love and that's fine with me.

I don't know if you can tell, but I had eaten part of the gnocchi and salad before I decided that it was photo worthy! My flash would not work, and so I had to photograph it in low light.

I seem to remember someone heating the riced potatoes to dry them out further, but I do not remember how they did that. Perhaps putting them in a 200-250 degree oven for ten minutes might help dry them. I might try adding potato starch next time. The gnocchi I made were very good, despite appearing like dumplings, and they were soft and pillowy. I added a bit of thyme to the dough as well for flavor, and I think that helped. My Italian cookbook said to add nutmeg, but I hate nutmeg in potatoes or spinach.

Zucchini latkes sound good! That's something I haven't tried yet.

Lars

When I rice potatoes for gnocchi, I do them on cookie sheets in single layers so they dry out some.

Lars, Lidia says, "Rice the potatoes while they are still quite warm and steaming--rubber gloves help. Spread the riced potatoes out in a thin layer so the steam rising from them has a chance to escape."

Interesting, no one has done fried gnocchi?

Give it a try. Crispy outside, soft inside, very nice.

dcarch

I had to come back to this thread to get the kale salad recipe again because I lost the print-out that I had made. I have now saved the recipe on my computer so that I will not lose it again.

Kevin thinks I should hold off on making gnocchi again because of the ordeal I went through last time, but at least now I have a potato ricer and some recent experience. Still, I will make a much smaller batch next time and omit the egg, since that makes it require more flour, which is okay when I make a large batch, but not for a small one. I have a baked Russet potato in the fridge, and I wonder if I could heat that up and use it...

Lars