Recipe: Carrot Gnocchi with Sage Butter and Parmesan (I Gnocchi di Carote)

CARROT GNOCCHI (I GNOCCHI DI CAROTE)

"One of the bonuses for an Italian cook whose wine-writing husband roams the vineyards of the country is to discover unexpected dishes. We were in Friuli whose cooking I knew had a soft place for. But I was not prepared to find carrot gnocchi. I fell for them at first bite. Their color, their tenderness, their mildly sweet flavor reminded me of the pumpkin gnocchi they make in Venice, but these are more tender and lighter and more prettily shaped."


1/2 pound carrots, about 5 or 6 of medium size
3 tablespoons butter
1 tablespoon onion, chopped fine
3 tablespoons flour
1 egg yolk
5 tablespoons freshly grated Parmigiano Reggiano cheese, divided use
Fine sea salt
Black pepper ground fresh from the mill
A pinch freshly grated nutmeg
3 fresh sage leaves
An oven-to-table baking dish

Wash and peel the carrots and trim the ends. Drop the carrots into boiling water and cook until tender, 15 to 17 minutes. Drain the carrots and slice them into 1-inch-thick rounds.

Put 1 tablespoon of the butter and all the chopped onion in a medium skillet and turn on the heat to medium. Cook the onion, stirring from time to time, until it becomes colored a pale gold.

Add the sliced carrots and cook for 6 to 8 minutes, turning them over occasionally, then put them in a food processor and puree to a creamy consistency. Don't mind if minute bits of carrot remain. Turn the puree out into a bowl and let cool completely.

When the puree is completely cool, add the flour, egg yolk, 3 tablespoons grated Parmesan, salt, pepper, and nutmeg and mix thoroughly to combine all the ingredients into a uniform batter.

Ahead-of-time note:You can prepare the recipe up to this point several hours in advance.

WHEN READY TO COOK:
Turn on the oven to 400 degrees F.

Bring water to a boil in a broad shallow saucepan, and add 2 to 3 tablespoons of salt. Set a bowl of water with ice nearby.

With a soup spoon, scoop up some of the carrot mixture. Holding a second spoon in your other hand and pointing the narrow tip of its bowl against the broad base of the bowl of the first spoon, scoop away the carrot mixture. Shifting the action to the first spoon, repeat the operation to produce a three-sided, oval-shaped lump of carrot mixture. Slide the lump off the spoon into the boiling water. Working quickly, add another 4 or 5 carrot lumps to the pan. Cook for 6 or 7 seconds, until all rise to the surface. Retrieve them with a slotted spoon and transfer them to the bowl of ice and water. Proceed in this manner until all the carrot mixture has been used.

Choose an oven-to-table baking dish that can contain all the carrot gnocchi in one layer without crowding. Lightly smear the bottom with a little of the remaining butter. Retrieve the gnocchi from the ice water and arrange them on the bottom of the buttered dish. Tear the sage leaves into small pieces and scatter them over the gnocchi. Sprinkle the gnocchi with the remaining grated Parmesan and dot with the remaining butter.

Bake on the upper shelf of the preheated 400 degree F oven for about 10 minutes. Serve directly from the baking dish

Makes 4 servings
Source: Marcella Says by Marcella Hazan