Gnocchi Gnightmare

There are some days when I get in the mood to cook, to try something new.  Friday night I had this “great” idea to make gnocchi (potato dumplings) for dinner.  Drew is studying for the CPA exam, and I thought it would be a nice treat to make a homemade meal for him.  Four hours later it wasn’t such a “great” idea…

Normally when making gnocchi you boil the potatoes and pass them through a vegetable mill, creating veggie spaghetti noodles if you will, but I didn’t have one.  This is pretty much where I should have turned back or bought a dang vegetable mill, but no.  Drew suggested we use a meat tenderizer to pound out the potatoes.  Yes, you can start laughing here.  Well a few minutes later potatoes are done and pealed and here I am unsuccessfully trying to pound out potatoes.  This was a terrible idea, some of the potatoes were mushed to oblivion and others were just chunks.  Getting even more frustrated because I am not even 1/8th the way through 3lbs of potatoes I think it just might work to use a citrus juicer to “squeeze” the potatoes out.  For your enjoyment I included a link so you can visualize the impending failure and mess that is on its way.  As you guessed, the juicer sure didn’t work… finally Drew comes out for a study break and I decide to ask if he has a cheese grater.  Thank God he did, the grader was working wonders for a while until… I managed to shave a chunk of my knuckle off.  Awesome, blood everywhere and no Band-Aids in the house.

This mess was building on one side of the kitchen while on the other I was making bacon and trying to roll out dough.  Imagine an entire 2 ft x 2 ft area covered in flour, potatoes, bacon and looking nothing like dough.  Below is the well I made of potatoes to mix in the egg.  This was the onset of another mess…

Eventually I am covered in mushy potatoes and trying to make actual dough.  Because I was not able to smash/squeeze/shred the potatoes into consistent parts the dough ended up being smooth/lumpy and an overall mess.  I managed to get flour all over the counter, the floor and me.

I eventually managed to make actual dumplings and got them into the water to cook.  While this disaster was happening I did make a great homemade Alfredo sauce.  In the end I was able to make two batches of the gnocchi, but not restaurant quality by any means.

Once I called Drew out for dinner I was laughing, on the verge of tears and begging him not to go into the kitchen.  The mess was terrifying. Drew ate it, whether or not he actually liked it I’m not sure.  By the time I got to actually cleaning the kitchen I was drinking wine straight out of the bottle.  Don’t judge, I know you all have done it at least once, and in my defense I already had enough dishes to clean.

Overall I made it through, but not without my fair share of battle wounds and frustrations.  It may be another 10 years before I brave this recipe, but from one amateur chef to another… don’t try this at home.

Channeling Our Inner Italian

For this weeks dinner and technique class, it was all about pasta. I often tell people my favorite food is carbs, so pasta covered in cheese with another layer of more carbs is ok by me!

One of the great things about being with someone who is good a keeping time (cause I am most definitely am not) is that for the first time in my life I am actually early. My best friend used to tell me that she would tell me to come over to her house 15 minutes before she actually wanted me to arrive to counteract my lateness.  Thanks to Drew I have outgrown and learned to fix this problem.  But arriving early provides for the perfect time for me to get us Starbucks – this is part of my secret plan to get Drew to like the brand.  He used to work as a barista at a local coffee shop, while I was a Starbucks barista.  Somehow our relationship has manage to work even with this small conflict between us.

Getting back to the story, this week in class was “Fast and Easy Pasta,” and we learned how to make homemade pasta, alfredo sauce and Drew’s favorite Bolognese sauce.  It was so delicious – the homemade alfredo was especially great!  With half a stick of butter, heavy cream and tons of Romano cheese, the sauce was everything you want.  Creamy, thick (great mouth feel) and would pair wonderfully with a Barbera or my personal favorite, a big red Barolo to cut through all the cream!

After class we decided the perfect dish would be lasagna.  Much easier than one would think, it turned out great.  Tricks to a great, easy lasagna: no bake lasagna noodles, fresh mozzarella, and a great sauce with big flavors.  We chose to go with a caramelized onion and garlic, you can never go wrong with garlic.  We layered it all up with sauce, cheese, more cheese, meat and toped it all off with fresh basil.  Making lasagna instead of pulling it out of the freezer is well worth the extra couple minutes of effort and taste much better in the end.

We decided to saute some zucchini and make garlic bread to go with the layers of lasagna goodness.  Every bite was delicious and made for great left overs the rest of the week.  Nice part for cooking for two or even one most nights it that there are always leftovers.  So your few extra minutes one night can really save time later in the week when it comes to dinner or lunch.

No cooking class next week, so we will see what Drew and I can do on our own.

Bon Appetit!