Gnocchi with Arugula Pesto

Gnocchi are little dumplings, boiled up and sauced like pasta; they're cute. Like other small hand-made pastas, these can be a nuisance to make, but it's relaxing. The grooved shape helps sauce stick. You can use a fork to roll the little dough bits, and we found an old butter shaper that looks a lot like the actual gnocchi boards that our friend Michael used when he introduced us to gnocchi.

Cook potatoes then rice them, or you can mash them if you don't have a potato ricer. Ricing makes for a smoother texture. Knead in an optional egg to help it bind, then knead in just enough flour that you can roll the dough into snakes (or ropes, as you please). Try for a diameter of about a half inch: thinner means you have to roll a lot more individual gnocchi, fatter makes them a bit bulky. Knead as little as possible to avoid developing gluten which will make them tougher and chewy. Cut the snakes into about 1 inch lengths.

Roll each snake with the back of a fork against the counter. This embosses them with grooves all around the curling motion should create a little pocket in the bottom when they come off the fork. In the photos, I'm doing this against my "gnocchi board" to make them more groovy (dude). 

Check the video, my first attempt for this blog! (fingers crossed, didn't work directly from phone uploads, trying to  re-upload...)

Well, dammit, works in the preview but I'm not seeing it in the published post. Try this animated version instead.

Rack 'em up on a floured surface until you're done with the dough ball. You can freeze them at this point -- they boil from frozen, and it's better than cooking then freezing.

Boil the gnocchi in a pot of rapidly boiling salted water. They are done when they float to the surface.

These are great with pesto. Our basil hasn't come up yet but we're inundated with peppery arugula so we made arugula pesto, just like we'd make the classic. In a food processor, blend plenty of arugula, extra virgin olive oil until it just makes a paste, brighten it up with some lemon juice; then pulse in pine nuts (we used pecans because we had a surplus) and grated parmesan or pecorino cheese, and process until smooth but with a bit of chunkiness. If it's too thick you can add more oil or a bit of water. Combine the gnocchi with the pesto, reserving some of the cooking water.

Gently mix the cooked gnocchi with the pesto, and adding a bit of the cooking water to get it to the looseness we want -- we're looking for a rich sauce, not a paste.

In the photo at the top, we've garnished with more grated pecorino.

These ones came out too dense and chewy.  I think we added too much flour to the potato and probably overworked the dough. I suspected this when I was rolling the snakes as they were easy to roll and didn't stick to the counter too much: I didn't need to add flour to prevent stickiness.  If this happens to you, don't worry about it, just back out the flour next time.  The best gnocchi are light and delicate, not like dumplings, but they're a bit more difficult to work with as there's less structure. 

The best ones I've ever made I threw together when I came home after a long night of drinking. I suspect they were delicate because I was starving and not stressing about the dough -- I just quickly combined the ingredients and didn't overwork it.