Gnocchi

My roommate Deborah cooks like an Italian stereotype. That's a good thing. I don't mean like Olive Garden I mean like Chef Boyardee. No written recipe, everything learned by cooking with her mother, simple, fresh, fast, delicious. I haven't had to cook much lately because she cooks most evenings and very kindly invites me to join the meal. I try to contribute ingredients but I usually have the wrong kind of pasta (they are very serious about having the right pasta for the right dish.), so I just eat and wash the dishes. (Max, did you know that along with their pizza, Italians are known for their pasta? It's true.) Like I said, they are very serious about having the correct pasta to go with the dish. One time Raimundo almost threw out what he had started to cook because he didn't have any short pasta and he had to have short pasta. Somehow I managed to convince him that just this once we could eat spinach and cece with long pasta. But even flat long pasta can be wrong when the dish needs long, round pasta.

The other night, Deborah made gnocchi from scratch. Maybe you aren't impressed. Maybe in your house you whip up batches of gnocchi from scratch the same way you can quarts of summer peaches or sneeze in your hand. But it impressed me. She was just making it for three of us so she noted that you only have to use half a kilo of flour; she said she is used to making it for her one sister and seven brothers at home when she uses upwards of three kilos of flour. Ahhh. Of course. Also, 90 grams of uncooked spaghetti is about right for an adult woman but a man needs more like 100 to 120 grams. Got it.

Back to the gnocchi. First you make a well of flour and add the eggs:

Then you knead it into a dough (she also added ricotta cheese), cut and roll it into the shape of a snake and cut it into gnocchi sized pieces:

After it's cooked, you add a sauce of ricotta and smoked salmon finished with rocket:

(I just failed my audition as a food photographer, I know.)

I try not to think about the exchange rate. Especially with what the dollar is doing right now. Otherwise, if I did the math, the 6 euro beer that seems like a good deal would freak me out because it's 9 dollars! I can easily spend 15 dollars at lunch. Just stick to the euros and don't think about the dollar equivalent.

Go Yankees! I wonder what Eric is doing right now?