Easy Ricotta Gnocchi
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Super impressive, your company never needs to know gnocchi is also super easy.
by Erin Henderson
I make this ricotta gnocchi on the regular: once you get the hang of it, it takes almost no time to prepare, and they freeze really well (in fact I think they cook better after being frozen) so I always have a bag in my freezer for quick weeknight dinners.
Top them with our fave Tomato Basil sauce, or a this spring-inspired Meyer lemon pesto.
For a super quick sauce of simple butter and cheese, melt a good four tablespoons of butter in a pan, add a small ladle of the cooking water, swirling to emulsify, grate in some lemon zest and a squirt of fresh lemon juice. Toss in the gnocchi swirling to coat and top with some finely chopped basil and parm.
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Easy Ricotta Gnocchi
Makes: about 4-6 portions (a sheet pan and a half of approximately 1 inch gnocchi… you decide how many that will feed.)
Chef level: moderate
Special equipment: gnocchi board (optional), digital scale
Ingredients:
- 450 g 00 full-fat ricotta
- 1 egg, beaten
- 150 g 00 flour (plus more for dusting)
- 1 tsp salt
- Few cracks black pepper
- Pinch nutmeg
How to Make It:
- Drain your ricotta: lay out 2-4 paper towels. Spread your ricotta across half. Fold the other half over the ricotta and press down. Leave for 15 minutes or so while you prep your ingredients. Pressing down on the ricotta you will see it peels away easily from the paper towel, which by now will be thoroughly moist.
- In a large bowl in which you can comfortably work, add ricotta, flour, salt, pepper, nutmeg, and the egg. Using a fork or your hand (I like to start with a fork to keep it all from sticking to my hands) being to stir the mixture together. After it’s mostly incorporated, you can use your hands or a bench scraper.
- Continue to mix until everything has come together and you have an intriguingly soft, but not sticky, ball of dough (you may have left over crumbly flour left behind and that’s totally normal).
- Generously dust a board or counter with flour.
- Using a butter knife or bench scraper, cut off a small strip from your ball of dough and roll it into a long rope about the width of your finger.
- Cut the rope into 1 inch pieces.
- Flour a gnocchi board, or a fork, and taking each piece, gently roll the dough down the ridges to make indentations in the gnocchi. Place finished gnocchi on a baking tray that been lined in parchment paper and dusted with flour.
- Keep going: cut off a section of dough, roll into a rope, cut, and roll along the ridges and place on the tray.
- You can cook the gnocchi fresh, but I think they keep their shape better if at least partially frozen. So place the tray, lying flat in the freezer for 10-15 minutes while you clean up the kitchen and prep your sauce.
- Bring a pot of water to a boil, generously salt it, and cook the gnocchi only until they float to the surface. You may have to do this in batches.
- When the gnocchi have floated up, removed from the water with a slotted spoon adding to the sauce.
Wine Pairing:
I like to let gnocchi, pillowy light and delicately flavoured, speak for themselves. Butter, tomato, or occasionally truffle oil, if I have it, is all I really want for a sauce.
Just like we have discussed manty, many times on this blog, the wine pairing depends upon the strongest flavour of the dish, which, in this case, is the sauce. For butter, I’d pair a cool-climate, delicately oaked Chardonnay; in tomato sauce, which is the most common way to serve it in Verona, try the local go-to Valpolicella; and with luxurious truffles, the siren song of Piedmont, a bright, fruity Barbera would be gorgeous.