Uploaded April 2021 | Updated September 2026, 3 days ago
This starchy dish is a treat for me, since I try to avoid really starchy food. But it is delicious, and gnocchi themselves are not all that hard or time-consuming to make, if you know what you’re doing. I was a bit out of practice, but they came out alright.
The idea is to take warm, freshly-cooked potato and mix with flour to form a slightly springy dough. If it is too soft and fluffy because it is mostly potato, then it will become disgusting when you try to boil the gnocchi. The dough just needs to hold to itself, and be strong enough to hold its shape and spring back just a bit when poked.
I remember making lots of gnocchi in school or professional kitchens long ago. There is a trick with the fork, rolling the little doughball under the fork to give it the requisite ridged texture; if done properly, the finished gnocchi will flip off the fork, ideally into a waiting floured sheet pan of finished gnocchi. Even if you can’t do this trick (which I have forgotten), you can make ridges in your gnocchi with a fork.
With the cheese and the pillowy gnocchi, the dish is quite rich. The blue cheese goes well with steak or beef in general; salad is also a good accompaniment, which will generally find harmony with both the cheese and the tomato.
Tomato Soup Recipe: youtu.be/ipKSBYNiydI
Makes enough for 4 people, about 40 gnocchi.
Equipment:
• saucepan for boiling potatoes
• stock pot/dutch oven for boiling gnocchi
• mixing bowl
• strainer, potato ricer or food mill
• mixing spoon
• strainer (as above) or slotted spoon, to rescue gnocchi
• glass or ceramic baking dish
• small to medium skillet or saucepan
Ingredients:
1 cup leftover tomato soup
1-2 ea Russet potato about a pound
1 cup AP flour add in parts, may need more
1 ea shallot
1 oz Marsala wine or similar
1/2 tsp basil, dried or up to 2 Tbsp fresh, chopped basil
2-3 oz Blue cheese 50-75g
to taste Salt, pepper, lemon juice, Tabasco, etc.
Procedure:
1. Preheat the oven to 350F. If you have a cast-iron pan, let it warm up in the oven.
2. Scrub the potatoes well, and place them with skins intact, into a saucepan.
3. Cover the potatoes with cold water and bring to a boil. Boil them 30 min or so, until they are just barely fork-tender. Do not allow them to cook until they are extremely soft.
4. Once the potatoes have boiled, they need to be dried off. I like to put them on a hot cast-iron pan in the oven for about 5 minutes. If you don’t have cast-iron, they can go right on the rack, or possibly on a sheet of foil.
5. Once the potatoes have dried, allow them to sit on the counter 5-10 minutes until they are cool enough to handle without burning yourself.
6. Mince the shallot and sweat it in some butter or oil in the skillet.
7. Add the tomato soup to the shallot and allow it to reduce slowly while finishing the gnocchi. It should be sauce-thick but not gloppy.
8. Gingerly peel the hot potatoes and force the potato flesh through the ricer, food mill, or strainer (using a spoon).
9. Add half the flour to the potato and mix. If it doesn’t seem a bit springy, add the rest of the flour, and possibly more. The dough should not be stiff, but it should not be fluffy either. Depending on how wet your potatoes were to start with, etc, the proportions can be quite different.
10. Start some water boiling for the gnocchi, in a large pot.
11. Taking the dough in quarters, roll it into a “sausage” about an inch in diameter, and then cut it into roughly inch-long nuggets.
12. Using a fork, try to teach yourself the gnocchi-flipping trick. Make ridges in the lumps by pressing and dragging the fork into one of the cut faces, smearing the gnocchi against the lightly-floured work surface, then peeling or scraping the gnocchi carefully off the back of the fork so that it curls into a ridged cylinder.
13. Once all the gnocchi are made, decide how many to cook, and freeze the rest in a single layer, not touching, on a tray in the freezer. Once frozen, they may be placed in a bag or box and kept in a freezer w/o a defrost cycle, such as a deep freeze, for a few months.
14. Gnocchi to be cooked should go into boiling water in a large pot. They take about two minutes to cook fresh, or three if they’re frozen. They will definitively float when they are done; wait for them to really seriously be floating, then take them out promptly.
15. Lift them out with a strainer/spider or slotted spoon. Drain them as well as possible and place them into the baking dish.
16. Season the sauce with the Marsala wine, and whatever other seasonings it needs to taste good as a pasta sauce.
17. Chop up the blue cheese and put two thirds of it into the sauce, and stir together.
18. Pour the sauce over the gnocchi and sprinkle with the remaining cheese.
19. Place the dish onto the top or second rack of the oven and turn on the broiler for 5 min or so.
20. Serve immediately, garnished with chopped parsely, parmesan, freshly ground black pepper, etc.
Music: bensound.com/royalty-free-music
This starchy dish is a treat for me, since I try to avoid really starchy food. But it is delicious, and gnocchi themselves are not all that hard or time-consuming to make, if you know what you’re doing. I was a bit out of practice, but they came out alright.
The idea is to take warm, freshly-cooked potato and mix with flour to form a slightly springy dough. If it is too soft and fluffy because it is mostly potato, then it will become disgusting when you try to boil the gnocchi. The dough just needs to hold to itself, and be strong enough to hold its shape and spring back just a bit when poked.
I remember making lots of gnocchi in school or professional kitchens long ago. There is a trick with the fork, rolling the little doughball under the fork to give it the requisite ridged texture; if done properly, the finished gnocchi will flip off the fork, ideally into a waiting floured sheet pan of finished gnocchi. Even if you can’t do this trick (which I have forgotten), you can make ridges in your gnocchi with a fork.
With the cheese and the pillowy gnocchi, the dish is quite rich. The blue cheese goes well with steak or beef in general; salad is also a good accompaniment, which will generally find harmony with both the cheese and the tomato.
Tomato Soup Recipe: youtu.be/ipKSBYNiydI
Makes enough for 4 people, about 40 gnocchi.
Equipment:
• saucepan for boiling potatoes
• stock pot/dutch oven for boiling gnocchi
• mixing bowl
• strainer, potato ricer or food mill
• mixing spoon
• strainer (as above) or slotted spoon, to rescue gnocchi
• glass or ceramic baking dish
• small to medium skillet or saucepan
Ingredients:
1 cup leftover tomato soup
1-2 ea Russet potato about a pound
1 cup AP flour add in parts, may need more
1 ea shallot
1 oz Marsala wine or similar
1/2 tsp basil, dried or up to 2 Tbsp fresh, chopped basil
2-3 oz Blue cheese 50-75g
to taste Salt, pepper, lemon juice, Tabasco, etc.
Procedure:
1. Preheat the oven to 350F. If you have a cast-iron pan, let it warm up in the oven.
2. Scrub the potatoes well, and place them with skins intact, into a saucepan.
3. Cover the potatoes with cold water and bring to a boil. Boil them 30 min or so, until they are just barely fork-tender. Do not allow them to cook until they are extremely soft.
4. Once the potatoes have boiled, they need to be dried off. I like to put them on a hot cast-iron pan in the oven for about 5 minutes. If you don’t have cast-iron, they can go right on the rack, or possibly on a sheet of foil.
5. Once the potatoes have dried, allow them to sit on the counter 5-10 minutes until they are cool enough to handle without burning yourself.
6. Mince the shallot and sweat it in some butter or oil in the skillet.
7. Add the tomato soup to the shallot and allow it to reduce slowly while finishing the gnocchi. It should be sauce-thick but not gloppy.
8. Gingerly peel the hot potatoes and force the potato flesh through the ricer, food mill, or strainer (using a spoon).
9. Add half the flour to the potato and mix. If it doesn’t seem a bit springy, add the rest of the flour, and possibly more. The dough should not be stiff, but it should not be fluffy either. Depending on how wet your potatoes were to start with, etc, the proportions can be quite different.
10. Start some water boiling for the gnocchi, in a large pot.
11. Taking the dough in quarters, roll it into a “sausage” about an inch in diameter, and then cut it into roughly inch-long nuggets.
12. Using a fork, try to teach yourself the gnocchi-flipping trick. Make ridges in the lumps by pressing and dragging the fork into one of the cut faces, smearing the gnocchi against the lightly-floured work surface, then peeling or scraping the gnocchi carefully off the back of the fork so that it curls into a ridged cylinder.
13. Once all the gnocchi are made, decide how many to cook, and freeze the rest in a single layer, not touching, on a tray in the freezer. Once frozen, they may be placed in a bag or box and kept in a freezer w/o a defrost cycle, such as a deep freeze, for a few months.
14. Gnocchi to be cooked should go into boiling water in a large pot. They take about two minutes to cook fresh, or three if they’re frozen. They will definitively float when they are done; wait for them to really seriously be floating, then take them out promptly.
15. Lift them out with a strainer/spider or slotted spoon. Drain them as well as possible and place them into the baking dish.
16. Season the sauce with the Marsala wine, and whatever other seasonings it needs to taste good as a pasta sauce.
17. Chop up the blue cheese and put two thirds of it into the sauce, and stir together.
18. Pour the sauce over the gnocchi and sprinkle with the remaining cheese.
19. Place the dish onto the top or second rack of the oven and turn on the broiler for 5 min or so.
20. Serve immediately, garnished with chopped parsely, parmesan, freshly ground black pepper, etc.
Music: bensound.com/royalty-free-music
