How to Make Potato Gnocchi

A simple tutorial and recipe for how to make potato gnocchi (potato dumplings).

Update:  3/20/16 pin-able image and minor editing

Gnocchi are delicious soft dumplings made of flour, eggs, and potatoes.  I'm focusing on potato gnocchi in this post but apparently they can also be made with ricotta, butternut squash, or other similar ingredients.

Gnocchi are delicious soft dumplings made of flour, eggs, and potatoes. [Tweet this]

Everything I know about potato gnocchi I learned from Italian Food Forever's How to make Potato Gnocchi.  It's a great step by step tutorial all about how to make gnocchi.  The main points I took away from this post were:  it's easier than most people think, bake instead of boil your potatoes, and don't use too much flour.  With these tips, I made potato gnocchi.  I loved it and so did my husband it was simple, inexpensive, and delicious.  There are many variations of gnocchi but for my first time, I kept it simple.  It turned out great so I'll definitely experiment with adding herbs and spices in the future and maybe even other main ingredients.  I want to try ricotta gnocchi some time too, but I think it's a good idea to start basic and get this recipe down before I start to experiment.

It's easier than you think, bake don't boil potatoes, & easy on the flour. [Tweet this]

Potato Gnocchi

Ingredients:

4 russet potatoes (about 2 cups of potato insides)
1 egg
1-1 1/2 cup(s) all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp salt

Start with baked potatoes and scrape out the insides.  Keep the potato skins for Loaded Baked Potato Skins.  You want about 2 cups of potato insides.

Squeeze the potato through your fingers, use a potato ricer, a fork, or a masher to break up the potato as finely as you can get it.

Place the potato mash in a medium bowl, add the salt, egg, and 1 cup of flour.  Stir briefly to combine then turn out onto a lightly floured surface.

Knead gently by hand adding the rest of the flour as needed until ingredients just come together and you have a smooth dough.  Don't overwork the dough and don't add too much flour.

Cut the dough in half (or more) and roll each half into a thick rope about the thickness of a thumb.  Thicker is fine you'll just have bigger gnocchi and if you get too thin the rope will break (so you will easily know if you are getting too thin).  Short ropes are easier to roll than long ropes but roll however you're comfortable.

Cut the rope into segments about the same size as the thickness of the rope.  The gnocchi are fine like this, but you can also indent them with your thumb against the tines of a fork to dimple and give them texture (great for holding sauce).

At this point, you can refrigerate the gnocchi until ready to cook, or I find it easier to freeze them (so they are more solid).  I use the gnocchi the same day I make them so I don't know how well they keep.

Drop the prepared gnocchi into boiling, lightly salted water and boil until they float.  Remove from the water and sauce as desired.  A simple garlic butter sauce is what I made (I'll post this next time) but a simple (tomato based) pasta sauce would be great, or a pesto, or a white wine sauce.

Makes about 2 servings (maybe more if you scrape out more potato insides or have really big potatoes)

Experiment and enjoy.

Other recipes mentioned in this post:

How to Make a Great Baked Potato	Loaded Baked Potato Skins	Simple Pasta Sauce  -----------------
White Wine Sauce and Shrimp Scampi	Spinach Pistachio Pesto

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Best of the Month July 2014

A recap of my most popular posts from July 2014

I'm late getting this written and posted.  I like to try to post these on the last day of the month but the end of August was opening weekend of college foot ball, Bacon Day, and then Labor Day on the 1st of September.  I'm still trying to get my blogging groove back with my weekends being occupied with football (my husband and I love football season).  So this is a little late but oh well...what can I do I like to procrastinate.

I finally broke 1,000 followers on Google Plus this month YAY!

**I've noticed that my "pin it" counter buttons don't always show the correct number of pins.  I know that I have personally pinned each picture at least once and usually more when I pin them to group boards but the counter has a big fat zero.  It also makes me wonder if my pins with a large count are correct.  This is very frustrating because I'd like to know actual counts.  Does anyone else experience this?  Know how to fix it?

Wild Rice Cherry Pecan Salad

A salad of wild rice, dried cherries, and pecans tossed in a raspberry vinaigrette.  It makes a great side dish or lunch. 241 views and 67 +1s.

Pudding Popsicles

A simple way to turn your favorite pudding into a frozen treat.  213 views and 37 +1s.

White Wine Sauce and Shrimp Scampi

A delicious and simple sauce made with white wine and butter.  Used to flavor pastas and many other dishes. 210 views and 37 +1s.

Tzatziki

A deliciously cool and refreshing yogurt dip/sauce made with cucumbers and dill.  176 views and 32 +1s.

Blue Cheese Alfredo

Whole wheat pasta tossed in a creamy, cheesy, blue cheese sauce studded with pistachios.  174 Views and 46 +1s.

Enjoy.

Linked to:  Cook Craft Share, Full Plate, Best of the Weekend, See ya in the Gumbo, Merry Mon, Two Cup, Tasty Tues, Tickle my Tastebuds, Wonderful Wed, Wed Roundup, Cook Craft Share


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Pork Scallopini

Thinly sliced pork served with a white wine mushroom sauce.

When planning dinner I had only one pork chop that needed to feed two.  Luckily the pork chop was thick (at least 1 inch).  What I decided to do was cut this pork chop into 4 thin slices and make scallopini.  It turned out great.  I sauteed the pork then reheated it in a white wine mushroom sauce.  To make sure we had plenty I served this with Wild Rice Cherry Pecan Salad, mashed sweet potatoes (they are under the pork in the center of the plate), and steamed broccoli.  It turned out to be quite a large meal.  My husband and I enjoyed it and stuffed ourselves on only one pork chop.

Pork Scallopini

Ingredients:

4 thin slices of pork (about 1/4 inch thick)
flour for dredging
1-2 Tbsp canola oil
1 Tbsp butter
1 onion, chopped
1 Tbsp garlic, minced
20 mushrooms, sliced (about 2 cups)
1 cup white wine
1 lemon, juice
salt and pepper to taste

Season both sides of the pork slices with salt and pepper and dredge in flour.  Shake off excess flour and fry the pork in oil, over medium high heat, in a large saute pan.  Since the pork is thin it only takes a couple of minutes per side.

Remove the pork from the pan, set aside, and keep warm.  Pour out excess oil from saute pan.

Saute onions, in butter, in the same pan.  When onions start to soften add mushrooms and garlic.  Add salt and pepper to taste.  Cook until the mushrooms have softened then pour in the wine.

Let wine reduce by about half and then add in the fresh lemon juice.  Return the pork to the pan until just reheated and serve immediately.

Makes 2 servings.

Enjoy.

Linked to:  Pretty Pintastic, Best f the Weekend, Show Stopper, Saturday Night Fever, Share it, Merry Monday, See ya in the Gumbo, Much Ado, Two Cup, Teach Me, LouLou Girls, Tasty Tues, Brag about it, Wonderful Wed, Whimsy Wednesday, Wed Roundup, Eat Create, Freedom Friday, Foodie Friends


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White Wine Sauce and Shrimp Scampi

A delicious and simple sauce made with white wine and butter.  Used to flavor pastas and many other dishes.

*picture courtesy of  Pixaby.com (free images) 

If you have never tried white wine sauce you definitely need to.  The first time I made this for myself was when I made a Shrimp Scampi.  At once I was addicted.  It's a very simple sauce to make and takes very little time but the flavor is absolutely amazing.  The wine adds a very delicate and fruity flavor to the sauce and you just mix it with butter, garlic, and shallots.  Such simple and easy to find ingredients combine to make a delicious sauce that tastes luscious and is great with pastas and shellfish. 

Some things to keep in mind about White Wine Sauce (note that I'm no expert I know very little about wine but I know what I like and I love to experiment):

Use a wine that you would drink.  It doesn't need to be expensive (I'm no wine connoisseur I usually spend no more than 5-10 dollars on a bottle of wine) but it is reduced so the flavors are concentrated.

Use a dry white wine.  I prefer Pinot Grigio but a sauvignon blanc or even a chardonnay would be fine.  I have used sweeter white wines before, because that's what I had, and it's not bad (it will do in a pinch) but not as good as the pinot.

If you prefer not to use wine you could substitute a light broth like chicken or vegetable but keep in mind that the wine adds a fruitiness that broths won't.  

Also note that the wine is cooked and reduced so the alcohol is cooked off so it's not like you will get drunk or even buzzed from it (but I do understand some people prefer to abstain).

Click here to see how to make a white whine sauce and my Shrimp Scampi recipe. 

Linked to:  Two Cup, LouLou Girls, Teach Me, Cook Craft Share, Full Plate, Eat Create Party, Freedom Friday, Pretty Pintastic, Best of the Weekend, Show Stopper, Sat Night fever, Share it, See ya in the Gumbo, Much Ado

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Clam Linguine

Clams cooked in white wine sauce then tossed with linguine.  A delicious dinner that may look fancy but is really quite simple.

Clams are one of the dishes that started my white wine sauce craze.  This is only my second time cooking clams and I love them.  Clams are easy to find in one of my favorite Chinatown markets.  They are right beside the shrimp and always look delicious.  The first time I cooked them I just had clams in white wine sauce that I served with crusty French bread, to dip in the sauce, and a vegetable.  This time I decided to do clam linguine.

The idea for clam linguine actually came from a book series I've read.  Patricia Cornwell's Kay Scarpetta series.  It's a crime/mystery book series where Kay is a medical examiner.  Kay is one of few characters who actually likes to cook and in the few books, of this series, I've read; one of her quick go to recipes is clam linguine.  Kay uses bottled clam juice (maybe canned clams...I don't remember) making this a great meal to throw together when you have very little in the fridge.  My thinking was that if bottled clam juice makes good clam linguine real clams would be even better.  The sauce from my first clam recipe was delicious with bread so I figured it would be great with pasta too.

Clam Linguine

Ingredients:

12-14 clams
1 Tbsp olive oil
1 Tbsp butter
1 Tbsp garlic, minced
1 Tbsp shallots, minced
1/2 cup dry white wine
1/2 pound linguine
parmesan
salt and pepper
parsley, optional

Clean clams and have them ready to go.  Discard any broken clams or any that are open and do not shut when tapped. My goal was to have at least 5 clams per person sometimes you have to discard a few.

Start the pasta cooking in boiling water (I just used the package instructions I think it was 9-11 minutes).

Meanwhile, heat the olive oil and butter over medium heat in a large skillet (12 inch is the one I used).  When the butter melts add the garlic and shallots.  Stir and cook until soft and fragrant and add a little salt.

Pour in the wine and let it come to a boil.  Reduce to a simmer and add the clams.  Cover and let steam for about 7 minutes or until the clams open.  Discard any clams that do not open.

The pasta should be done by now, drain it and add the pasta to the clams mixing well and remove from heat.  Add chopped parsley if using, cover and let sit for a few minutes to allow the pasta to absorb some of that delicious sauce.

Makes 2 servings.  Serve with Parmesan, I used shaved Parmesan but grated or shredded would be fine.  Crack fresh ground pepper on top if you like and enjoy.

Linked to:  Best of the Weekend, Show Stopper, Saturday Night Fever, See ya in the Gumbo, Much Ado, 2 Cup, LouLou Girls, Tasty Tuesday, Brag About It, Whimsy Wednesday, Wednesday Roundup, Full Plate, Eat Create Party, Freedom Friday


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Mushroom Spinach Tomato Pasta

Linguine noodles in a light white wine and garlic sauce tossed with mushrooms, spinach and grape tomatoes.

Pasta is an easy go to recipe when I don't really feel like spending too much time or thought on dinner.  I always have some kind of pasta in my pantry and if I don't it's sold at the corner store (that is only 1 block away). White wine sauce is a very simple sauce for pasta that tastes great and doesn't require much time and few ingredients.  Yes, opening a jar/can of pasta sauce is probably easier but I don't like to use store bought pasta sauce and I don't can my own...and sometimes I don't want a tomato based sauce.  I love white wine sauce because it is flavorful and light (it doesn't sit heavy in your stomach it may or may not be any lighter in calories than other sauces but I like to think it is).  My basic white wine sauce is made of olive oil, shallots, garlic, and dry white wine (my favorite is Pinot Grigio) then I just toss in whatever I happen to have on hand.  In this case it was mushrooms, spinach, and tomatoes.  This dinner takes less than 30 minutes (the longest part for me is waiting for my ancient electric stove to boil water...I rent so I can't just get my dream stove).

Mushroom Spinach Tomato Pasta

Ingredients:

3 Tbsp olive oil
2 Tbsp minced shallots
2 Tbsp minced garlic
1 cup sliced mushrooms
1/4 cup vegetable broth or water, optional
1/2 cup halved grape tomatoes
1 large handful baby spinach
1/2 cup white wine
1/2 pack linguine, cooked al dente
Parmesan
salt
pepper

Heat olive oil over medium heat in a large skillet.  Add shallots, garlic and mushrooms.

Cook until fragrant add the broth/water if the pan gets to dry then add the tomatoes.  Let the tomatoes begin to blister and soften slightly then add the spinach, wine and salt to taste.

Continue cooking until the wine reduces by about half and add the cooked pasta.  Turn off the heat, cover the pan, and let sit for 5-10 minutes.

Toss and serve with parmesan and fresh cracked pepper.

Makes 2-3 servings.

Enjoy.

Linked to: Eat Create Party, Freedom Fridays, Best of the Weekend, Show Stopper, Saturday Night Fever, See Ya in the Gumbo, Much Ado, The Yuck Stops Here. Two Cup Tuesday, LouLouGirls, Brag About It, Whimsy Wednesday, Full Plate


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