Potato Gnocchi

Amber and I went on a trip to Melbourne a couple months ago and had the best Gnocchi of our lives. They can be found at a pasta and espresso bar called Pellegrini's in the city center. It was light but also had a nice bite to it, without being stodgy. They also held up great to the rich tomato sauce served with it. It was then that I realized I needed to get a good feel for gnocchi dough. We make gnocchi at work, but it is light as a feather and we always pan fry it and usually serve it as a side dish to lamb, or simply dressed in butter.


I started by pulling all the books off my shelf that I thought might have some good insight into gnocchi making. A few of them didn't have anything useful so they were out. Marcella Hazan's gnocchi only had flour and potato, and so did the recipe by Jack Bishop. Seemed like a very purist approach, but I found it interesting as the recipe we use at work contains eggs, parmesan, and nutmeg. It made me question whether the egg was necessary to bind the dough. I suppose if the potatoes were still hot and steaming when flour was added there would be plenty of moisture to bind it together... However, I do really like the added flavor from the parmesan and nutmeg so I thought I would keep them in my final recipe. Mario Batali's recipe seemed to beat the living hell out of the dough, which i thought would make the gnocchi way too tough. Both Paul Bertolli and Giorgio Locatelli's gnocchi recipes were incredibly detailed though also very different. Paul Bertolli's recipe had a small amount of cream in it, and I kinda liked that idea. Maybe the cream would soften the dough up enough for it to not go too hard and chewy?

The more I read recipes and instructions the more I realized there are a lot of different opinions on how to make gnocchi, though the ingredients in most recipes were very similar, the techniques were wildly different. Most say to use a floury starchy potato, but one recipe I came across said waxy ones were best. Some recipes boil the peeled potatoes, some say to leave the skin on, some said to bake, some to steam. It all started to become a bit confusing. I think it's just going to be one of those things that you have to make over and over again, like bread, and really get the feel for it. Cooking is all about personal preference, and there are about a hundred thousand different ways to skin a cat, right?

I settled on the quantity of potato, flour, and eggs from Giorgio Locatelli's recipe with the addition of cream suggested by Paul Bertolli. I also decided floury potatoes would be best and that I would boil them in their skins, thinking this would provide a truer potato flavor while also protecting them from absorbing too much water while cooking. I also took the advice of Jack Bishop and would finish them in the oven to really dry them out. I will admit that adding the cream to the recipe made me a little worried about too much moisture in the dough and visions of adding more and more flour to the dough and overworking it ran through my head. I wanted those babies dry as possible.


Final Gnocchi Recipe:


1 kg (2.2 pounds) floury potatoes, scrubbed
2 small eggs, whisked
1/4 cup cream
a good pinch of freshly grated nutmeg
1 1/2 tsp salt
320g (11.3 oz) all-purpose flour
1/4 cup grated parmigiano reggiano cheese



My good friend, Blake, had just recently sent me an awesome Brian Jonestown Massacre playlist, so I put that on full blast and then got to work. I started by pre-heating the oven to 200 degrees (400 fahrenheit) and putting the potatoes in a pot with cold, lightly salted water and then brought them to a boil. While they were boiling away I got all my other ingredients sorted and ready to go because once the potatoes were done I would need to work fast so they would stay warm. Once the potatoes were very tender i strained them and allowed them to cool down just enough so i could peel them. After peeling them I cut them into quarters, placed them on a baking tray, loosely covered them with foil, and stuck them in the oven. I wanted to get them really hot again as well as get out as much moisture as I could.

Once they were hot and dry I passed them through a fine sieve into a bowl. Using the back of a large spoon I smashed the potatoes through the sieve in small batches. This was quite a lot of work and I was really wishing I had a food mill (which every single recipes advised). I added the eggs, cream, salt, parmigiano-reggiano, and nutmeg to the potatoes and then mixed everything together. Then I poured the flour onto my clean work bench and made a well in the center. I put the potato mixture in the well and using a spatula (as I don't own a pastry scraper) I cut the flour into potatoes until it came together. Using the palms of my hands I gently pressed the dough together until it formed a soft smooth dough. I shaped it into a log and cut it into four equal pieces. Keeping the bench floured, I rolled each piece into ropes. I ended up cutting each rope in half again and placed them on a baking tray lined with parchment paper and dusted with flour to make sure they wouldn't stick. I put the tray in the fridge to let them rest and firm up a bit so that they would be easier to shape later.

While the dough took it's 30 minute nap in the fridge I had a much deserved beer.

To shape the gnocchi i used a floured fork and snipped off little rectangles from the rope. Using the back of the fork, starting where the tines begin, I pressed my thumb into the little rectangle lightly while rolling it downwards and letting it drop off the end of the fork. This way you get little dimples in the back of each gnocchi and a nice pattern on the top. My first few looked pretty hideous, but I soon got the hang of it. Once they were all shaped they went back onto the floured baking tray and back in the fridge until I needed to cook them. I ended up with two trays of gnocchi, probably around 120 pieces. I set aside what I needed for the nights meal and froze the rest. Gnocchi really should be cooked within a couple hours of being made. They will oxidize and go gray over time.


So it was finally time to cook these bad boys and see how they turned out. I brought a pot full of salted water to the boil and dropped the gnocchi in. I turned the heat down to a simmer because boiling could make them fall apart. Once they float to the surface they are done. Using a slotted spoon i took them out and put them strait into my simmering tomato sauce and served them immediately with tuna meatballs (but that is a whole other story), fresh grated parmigiano-reggiano, and toasted walnuts.


So how were they? They were actually quite good. A lot better than I had expected to be perfectly honest. They were still a bit lighter than I had hoped, and next time I will add a touch more flour and maybe not be quite so gentle with the dough. I will have to try this again soon so the feel of the dough is fresh in my mind. I will say that it was a lot of hard work peeling the potatoes after they had been boiled, painstakingly pressing them through a sieve, and then shaping each one, but the end result is worth it. Cooking the potatoes in their skins added a really great earthy potato flavor that you wouldn't get had you peeled the potatoes first. This recipe is the definition of a labor of love.