Kabocha squash gnocchi

We got an orange Kabocha squash at the farmers market, roasted it, then turned it into gnocchi served with pesto. It came out rather well.

Sauced with pesto and served

The Kabocha's like a small pumpkin which comes in deep green and orange varieties; ours was orange, which they say is the sweetest, akin to sweet potatoes. We cut it into wedges (with a heavy cleaver), seasoned with EVOO, grated ginger, a touch of cayenne and a little salt, and roasted until it was tender. It would have been a fine side dish -- just like that -- but we decided to push our luck and make gnocchi.

Now, the best gnocchi I ever made was after a night of carousing: when I came home, more than a little tipsy and famished, I riced a microwaved potato, added an egg and just the right amount of flour to make the lightest, most silky gnocchi we've had at home -- sadly, I've never been able to repeat that level of excellence.  We've also made gnocchi with squash, but most varieties are so wet you have to add a lot of flour to get them to cohere and they turn out leaden. What could go wrong this time? Happily, it worked well.

The proportions here were dictated by how much squash pulp I had after running it through the food mill; I added flour at a 1/3rd ratio, then added more until it barely held together. This amount made 4 dinner portions.

450 g      Roasted Kabocha squash (roast first, mill, measure)
1          Egg, beaten
150-200 g  Flour, start at the low end, add until it holds

Run the roasted Kabocha through a food mill. The skin is thin, so don't bother peeling, the mill will shred it finely enough.
Add the Egg and combine well.
Add the lower amount of the Flour in stages so you don't make it too stiff and it combines well.
If it's still very soft, add more Flour but keep it as loose as you can.

Take about a quarter of it, roll it out on a lightly floured surface into a snake about 1cm diameter.

Roll out a snake using just enough flour so it doesn't stick; note the butter pat on the left

Realize that pasta will expand quite a bit as it cooks; our thicker snakes resulted in gnocchi that were a bit larger than I'd have liked.
Cut into about 2cm segments.
Roll each with the tines of a fork to create groves; we have an ancient wooden grooved butter pat that acts like an actual gnocchi board.

Rolled and shaped with the grooved butter pat

Cook in salted water until the inside is no longer floury; most recipes say "until they float" but if your gnocchi are large like ours were, the insides may not be done yet. We needed about 5-6 minutes.

First batch (2 servings) boiling, second batch waiting

Toss in heated sauce. The classic is browned butter and sage, but we used a pesto made from arugula we grew.

Toss gently with warmed sauce, serve