Victor took over the kitchen the other day to create a bit of a feast – Shrimp and Gnocchi with a Pesto Sauce and homemade Focaccia! I love it when he gets into the kitchen!
We grew a bunch of basil for the sole purpose of making pesto, this year – and the pesto came out perfect! He made 3 4oz jars for the freezer and an 8oz jar for the ‘fridge! It’s amazing how many things one can do with pesto…
Pesto
- 6 cups loosely packed basil leaves
- 1/3 cup pine nuts, preferably Italian
- 2 garlic cloves, chopped
- 1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil
- 1/2 tsp kosher salt (or to taste)
- 2/3 cup Parmigiano Reggiano
Quickly blanche basil and immediately place in a large bowl of ice water.
Combine ingredients in food processor and pulse until desired consistency. taste and add additional cheese, nuts, or S&P, to taste. Place in jars and add a thin layer of olive oil on top. Refrigerate or freeze.
And then there was the gnocchi…
The secret to a great potato gnocchi is cooking the potatoes in their skins and then peeling as soon a they can be handled. There’s less moisture in the potato which translates to less flour – making a more delicate product.
Victor more-or-less follows Lidia’s recipe. Since he’s been making these for years, he really doesn’t have a written recipe and the volume is always dictated by the potato.
Here is Lidia’s recipe. It’s copied from her website – this version is not behind a paywall.
Potato Gnocchi
- 4 large, unpeeled Idaho (russet) potatoes, (about 2 ¼ pounds), washed
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 2 large eggs
- Dash of freshly ground white pepper
- 3 cups unbleached all-purpose flour, or as needed
Put the potatoes in a large pot and pour in enough cold water to cover them by at least three fingers. Bring to a boil and cook until they are tender when pierced with a skewer, about 40 minutes. Lift them out of the water and let stand just until cool enough to handle. The hotter the potatoes are when you peel and rice them, the fluffier the riced potatoes will be. Scrape the peels off the potatoes and rice the potatoes. Spread the riced potatoes out in a thin layer to expose as much of their surface as possible to the air.
While the potatoes are cooling, bring 6 quarts of salted water to a boil in an 8-quart pot over high heat.
On a cool, preferably marble, work surface, gather the cold riced potatoes into a loose mound with a well in the center. Beat the eggs, 1 teaspoon salt, and the white pepper together in a small bowl until blended and pour into the well. Work the potatoes and egg together with both hands, gradually adding as much flour as necessary to form a firm but moist dough. Stop frequently as you mix to scrape up the dough that sticks to the work surface and reincorporate it into the dough. Forming the dough should take no longer than 10 minutes from start to end. The longer the dough is worked, the more flour it will require and the heavier the dough- and the finished gnocchi- will be. As you work, dust the dough, your hands, and the work surface lightly with flour as soon as the dough begins to feel sticky.
Cut the dough into six equal portions. Using the outstretched fingers and palms of both hands, roll each piece of dough into a rope about 1/2 inch thick. Cut the rope crosswise into 1/2-inch pieces. Sprinkle the pieces with flour, then roll each piece between your palms into a rough ball. Reflour your hands as necessary to prevent sticking. Hold a fork at an angle to your work surface. Dip the tip of your thumb in flour. Take a dough ball and, with the tip of your floured thumb, press it lightly but firmly against the tines of the fork while, at the same time, rolling it downward along the tines. The dough will wrap around the tip of your thumb, forming a dumpling with a deep indentation on one side and a ridged surface on the other. (You can use the nongrating side of a flat or curved cheese grater for a different effect.) Set the gnocchi on a baking sheet lined with a lightly floured kitchen towel as you form them. Repeat with the remaining five pieces of dough. At this point the gnocchi must be cooked or frozen immediately.
And then there was focaccia…
I had made pizza dough a while back and froze half of the batch – each recipe makes two pizzas. Victor took out the dough and made sun-dried tomato focaccia to go with the gnocchi. For the focaccia, he kneaded in chopped sun-dried tomatoes and then sprinkled cheese on top before baking.
This is the perfect pizza dough. It really develops flavor with the slow refrigerated rise. This is a take on a pizza dough from La Cucina Italiana, but it’s also pretty darn close to the dough I used to make at Pirro’s in San Francisco back in the ’60s and early ’70s. Pizza is best cooked on a pizza stone in a VERY hot oven – 500°F+. At Pirro’s, our ovens were set at 650°F.
Pizza Dough
- 360 ml warm water (105°F/38ºC to 110°F/40ºC)
- 1 g active dry yeast
- 500 g “00” flour or unbleached all-purpose flour (plus more for dusting)
- 10 g fine sea salt
- Olive oil for the bowl
Sprinkle yeast over warm water in bowl of mixer fitted with dough hook. Let proof about 5 minutes.
Mix together flour and salt. Add to yeast mixture. Mix on low speed about 4 minutes or until dough forms a coarse ball. Stop mixer and cover bowl with a towel. Let dough rest about 5 minutes, then remove towel and continue mixing another 2 minutes or so.
Lightly oil a large bowl. Form dough into a ball, transfer to bowl and turn to lightly coat with oil. Cover bowl tightly with plastic wrap and let stand at room temperature 30 minutes, then refrigerate overnight.
Punch down dough, re-roll, and return to bowl. Tightly cover bowl with plastic wrap and refrigerate at least 4 hours or up to 24 hours.
Divide dough into 2 pieces; shape pieces into balls and place on a lightly floured work surface. Loosely cover with a damp kitchen towel and let rise at warm room temperature until doubled, about 2 hours.
It’s nice to be married to a man who can cook!