Delicious fluffy pillows of cheesy goodness. That’s really all ricotta gnocchi is isn’t it?!! To celebrate my 1000 followers joining me on The Farmer Instagram page I made ricotta gnocchi and somehow, I really am not artistic at all, managed to write 1000 out of it. I was pretty proud of myself as this is a scientific brain, not at all an artistic brain. Have you seen it? What did you think?
I love making fresh pasta and this will become evident as you join me here on the blog. On my NEW blog! That sounds awesome to me as I have been developing this concept for a good 12 months now and finally, I have a website. That little old me designed and developed! It is a bit of a work in progress but it will get there! I digress.
Here is what you will need for your gnocchi. Let's go:
For the gnocchi I purchased a kilo of fresh ricotta from my local supermarket and drained 500g in a sieve for a good hour. You don’t really need to do this unless it is really watery. The paper towel that I lined the sieve with was wet but it depends on the quality of your ricotta.
To your ricotta add two eggs and two thirds of a cup of Parmesan cheese and a pinch of salt. Use a good quality Parmesan I suggest as you can taste the flavour in your gnocchi. Give this a good mix before adding a cup of plain flour. I found my mixture was quite wet and required nearly another quarter of a cup of flour once I started to roll it out. Once it is all combined place about a quarter of the mixture on a floured surface. It will stick so lots of flour is good! Roll it into a thin sausage and cut little 3cm lengths (dip your knife into the flour pot to stop them sticking). I then used a little dessert fork to make an indent on the pasta to help it soak up whatever sauce you are having with it! Place the gnocchi on a tray and use the rest of the mixture to make more! I then froze the gnocchi in ziplock bags for later use.
As I had a heap of ricotta leftover (500 grams to be exact) I thought I would make a really easy ricotta sauce with baby spinach. I also wanted to see how my new little frypan handled the oven so I sprinkled some Parmesan over the top and baked it. It passed the test (he he, pun very much intended – passed/pasta. Never mind….).
For the ricotta and spinach sauce (enough for one):
Heat your grill to about 180 Celcius. Cook your gnocchi in boiling water until it starts to float. While you are doing this brown some garlic in a little slice of butter (in an oven proof pan). Once the gnocchi start to rise to the top, scoop them in with your garlic and make sure you add a bit of the cooking water in too. This helps the pasta bind to the sauce. Once you have browned your little gnocchi dumplings add in roughly 100 grams of ricotta and stir around. Add some handfuls of baby spinach and stir to combine until the spinach wilts. Give it a good lashing of salt and pepper, add a handful of grated Parmesan and shove under the grill for roughly 5 to 10 minutes. Just watch that it doesn’t burn! Serve immediately and be prepared to be awed by how clever you are!
You can obviously serve your gnocchi with whatever sauce you want. If you have an hour to spare then enjoy making the gnocchi and freeze for later. Let me know if you get creative and use my recipe. I would love to see what you pair the gnocchi with!
If you would like a printable PDF version of the recipe then please click on the "recipe" tab and you will find it there.
Hashtagaramas
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