That’s A Lot Of Gnocchi!

The expression used often among Italians is “Christmas with family, Easter with whoever you like”.  Easter in our family was often shared with old family friends, coworkers, neighbors, distant cousins, Irish cousins, in-laws and possibly a few outlaws.  Nanna diCicco’s house was filled past capacity, the men were telling stories and having “red coffee”, the older women were fussing in the kitchen and my Mom was taking turns with the other Moms yelling at me and the gang of siblings, cousins, and various other kids that were running wild.

All the kids were taking part is an American Easter tradition, which involves banging each other with baskets, spreading  pink plastic grass all through the house,  chocolate bunny theft and my personal favorite, hardboiled egg hurling.   This tradition is fueled by excessive sugar intake and often results in a wicked “Peeps Sugar Rush” for anyone under the age of 11.

At this point Nanna diCicco would intervene, calling all the diavolo bambini to the kitchen to make gnocchi.  I was older and spent a lot of time with my grandmother and knew the story, but she always repeated it for the younger ones and strays we had picked up along the way.  Everyone was to wash up as clean as possible and return to lend our tiny fingers to the gnocchi process, explaining that only our tiny fingers can make the perfect gnocchi and we needed a lot of gnocchi to feed all these hungry people, so we must be quiet, and work fast.  For whatever reason, my tiny blue haired grandmother calmed the “Peeped out miniof  mob’ and we all lined up on either side her giant pasta board and got busy,

Nanna showed us how to roll the little dough ball and make the perfect indent in each one..  I am sure the uniformity and technique may have left something to be desired, but Nanna assured us that only our little fingers could make such perfect things.  Seemed to be the perfect antidote for the “Peeps Sugar Rush” and soon the gnocchi were headed for the table. 

Nanna often served the little potato dumplings with a simple brown butter and some shaved parmesan cheese, sometimes with marinara or other sauces. However they were prepared they were always delicious and quickly disappeared..

Luica’s recently participated in “The Taste Of Nashoba” which was a great event sponsored by The Nashoba Valley Chamber with almost 1000 in attendance.   I made 4500 of Nanna’s gnocchi for the event, that’s a lot of Gnocchi! As I rolled and pressed, rolled and pressed and rolled and pressed some more, I though of Nanna and wished for help from little fingers.  The show was a great success and as always Nanna’s Gnochhi were delicious and quickly all 4500 disappeared.

This recipe will be featured in the upcoming episode of “Our Tavola To Yours” watch on your local cable or check our Facebook page.

This recipe can easily be adapted to feed 1000

Gnocchi

• 4 lbs Yukon gold potatoes
• 2.5 cups flour
• 2 Tbsp salt
• 1 tsp white pepper
• 2 eggs
• 1 cup ricotta cheese

Begin by boiling the potatoes in water until fork tender (figure that takes 20 minutes, give or take). Drain and peel off the skins while hot.

While the potatoes are still hot, push them through a ricer into a large bowl. Do not even think of using a food processor or a blender or you’ll be making glue.

Meanwhile, in another bowl, mix all of the other dough items (flour, ricotta, egg, etc). Work this into the potato. Handle the dough as little as is necessary to make the dough somewhat homogenous

Divide it into 8 pieces. On a lightly floured surface, roll each piece out to be roughly 1/2 inch diameter cylinders. Just like when you were kneading the dough before, try to keep the handling to a minimum (so don’t go balling it up, rolling it out, starting over, etc. Just roll it out and stop).

Cut into one inch pieces and roll and press your finger into make indent in each one.

Drop into boiling water, don’t over crowd, do in batches and watch for the gnocchi to float in around five minutes.

Remove – Sauce with your favorite sauce or just a little brown butter and parmesan.

Enjoy!

www.LuciasTavola.com