Something old, something new
"Once again it's the Italians who are so clever at inventing such simple things out of what seem to be fairly ordinary ingredients but then become something quite outstanding." Delia Smith
I decided to bring forward my new year's resolution, gleaned from Robert Carrier's Cookery Course, to make at least one new dish each week. It was a bit of a cheat really in that I had already decided to cook spinach gnocchi for dinner and I had already decided - also in praise of my cookery course post, to use Robert Carrier's recipe. Then I thought I would do a post on spinach gnocchi and found a rather delectable recipe from Nigel Slater. But his recipe was for plain potato gnocchi with spinach in the cream sauce he cooked them in. He didn't even tell you how to make the gnocchi. But I did want to do spinach gnocchi, so in the end I decided to combine the two recipes - so something old, something new and I was off with my resolution. An old recipe with a new 'finishing' twist.
I actually have several spinach gnocchi recipes that I have used but I can never remember which one is the best - Elizabeth David, Delia, Bert Greene, Robert Carrier, Jane Grigson - but not, surprisingly Jamie Oliver or Claudia Roden. The Silver Spoon has a recipe of course, but I'm not sure whether I have tried that one or not. I have to work out a way of letting myself know which one to use. I should make notes in my cookery books more. On this occasion though, as I said, I had decided to use Robert Carrier's just because I had been talking about him. A sort of homage. And I had a bunch of spinach that needed to be used.
There seem to be three basic ways of making spinach gnocchi. One with potatoes and spinach, one with ricotta and spinach and one with a mixture of potatoes, ricotta and spinach. Plus to a lesser or greater degree, flour and other cheeses. Robert Carrier's is basically the ricotta version.
But just to show what a poor cook I am really, I did not use ricotta, because I was in Aldi and they only had a packaged 'smooth' ricotta which I thought would be much too soft. So I settled for their cottage cheese which I reasoned would be drier. Then I found I had not allowed myself enough time - because I had to drain the cheese to make it even drier and I also had to put the mixture, once formed, into the refrigerator for half an hour. Because I had not drained either the spinach or the cheese enough, the mixture was rather sloppy - and so I therefore added more flour - rather too much in fact, which meant that really they were not as light as they should be. So (a) I should have taken myself across to Woolworth's and bought some 'proper' ricotta from the deli section, (b) I should have drained the cheese, and the spinach thoroughly, (c) I should not have added so much flour and (d) I should have left them in the fridge for longer - I only left them there for about 10 minutes as opposed to 30. They were a bit too heavy I fear. Beverley Sutherland Smith is right in saying:
"Italian gnocchi can be heavy and seriously solid, not a dish I order in a restaurant unless I know the reputation of the kitchen. Yet good home-made gnocchi which are light, melting and yet at the same time have enough texture to comfort the palate, make you understand why they are so loved in Italy." Beverley Sutherland Smith
They did stay together though - the real danger is that when you cook them in the boiling water they will disintegrate. But because the mixture was so soft it was difficult to get much shape to them - either round or cork shaped. That would have needed even more flour. Mind you I could have called them malfatti:
Malfatti, broadly speaking, translates from the Italian as "badly formed", but they're not deserving of their name. These little gnocchi-like morsels – all dimpled and vivid green – are just perfect." Claire Thomson, The Guardian
On the left are malfatti - a bit flat and misshapen (like mine) and on the right are Beverley Sutherland-Smith's cork shaped ones.
Then there are gnudi which are sort of the same thing but apparently take two days to make - well I didn't look them up and Jamie Oliver certainly has a version that doesn't take two days. I think they are the ones I made basically - the ones without potatoes, and maybe you have to leave the mixture in the fridge overnight, not just 30 minutes - or 10 in my case. That would probably make sense - because mine, even after 10 minutes had certainly firmed up enough to sort of shape into gnocchi. And now that I think about it I didn't do as Robert Carrier said and add butter to the mixture - I added a bit of the juice from cooking the spinach (in butter). Not sensible as that would have made the mixture even sloppier. And butter would have solidified it a bit too. Really it's a wonder that they turned out to be eatable at all!
As I looked still further at the various recipes that I have I found that yes - what I made are really gnudi - or even ravioli verde, which is what they are named in Tuscany, and that yes, the mixture should have been left in the fridge overnight. I also discovered yet another variation used by both Elizabeth David and Jane Grigson - they cooked the cheese with the spinach. I guess this might also have got rid of some of the liquid. Because liquid is definitely the killer thing here. Mind you it's possible that I could have just dropped spoonfuls of the mixture into the boiling - well simmering - water. They might have stayed together. The shape doesn't really matter. I just wasn't game to try.
So much for the gnocchi themselves. The really new thing for me was the way I served it. Having cooked and drained them I then put them in a buttered dish, and tucked in some cooked spinach (which I had kept back when I made the gnocchi), a tiny bit of gorgonzola and poured over a mixture of cream and the remains of the spinach cooking liquid. It was supposed to be just cream - and maybe it should have been. Beverley Sutherland Smith seems to think so anyway.
"The final heating is done by coating them with cream, nothing else is really successful to create the right sauce, which soaks into these gnocchi So don't try and skip this part. If you feel guilty about using cream, best to do another sort of dish instead."
I confess I did feel guilty about cream - not for myself - but my husband always gets a bit holier than thou about it, so that's why I mixed in the spinach cooking liquid. Which I think was actually OK. I also couldn't resist sprinkling some parmesan (well actually grana padana) and now I see that Beverly Sutherland Smith does too.
There are heaps and heaps of different suggestions as to how to serve them, but keeping it simple is always best I feel. I actually do not think tomato sauce is right - it's a competing flavour - you end up tasting the sauce not the gnocchi. I thought Nigel Slater's idea of tucking in some spinach leaves was good - it enhanced the spinachness of the dish. The gorgonzola too gave it a hint of something special.
Delia has a recipe on her website which is probably a pretty good summation of them all - she has potatoes and ricotta and serves them pretty simply. Her version is on the left. The others are from here and there.
I learnt a lot with this first experiment in cooking something new. Mostly how you really should follow the recipe. Read it through first (then I would have noticed the time in the fridge and the draining of the cheese) and don't make substitutes. In fact I broke a whole lot of cardinal rules That I tell others to follow. In spite of all that though, the finished product was extremely eatable. It just might have been better if I had done what I was told.
"I dream about eating this recipe on a warm, sunny summer's day outside, but in winter it's still an excellent lunch for two people or as a first course for four. For a variation, instead of using all cheese, halve the amount and add 6 oz (175 g) of crisp, crumbly bacon or pancetta." Delia Smith
And it's vegetarian too. So another tick in the box for eating vegetarian at least once a week. Today I'm going one better - I'm fasting.
