Macaroni with peas, bacon and ricotta

After working today I figured I wanted something tasty and quick. Quick these days seems to be the major keyword…. Tom is out tonight, which meant I get to make things he doesn’t like and he doesn’t like ricotta, so when I saw this recipe in the Good Food of this month, that seemed like the perfect choice. The original recipe calls for mint, but they didn’t have it in the supermarket and to be quite honest; for some reason I don’t really think that mint and pasta are such a fabulous combination anyway. I was willing to try it, but the supermarket got in the way.. (o excuses, excuses…)

It was really quick. The cooking of the pasta was really the part that took the longest (5 minutes) so fabulously tasty and ridiculously fast for something so good. Now I will tell you the recipe a little later. I have to share one more secret today and that is that I am addicted…. Yes, ladies and gentlemen… I am addicted. You can guess to what if you have a look at the next photo:

I’m addicted to Grey’s Anatomy!! Now unfortunately I have run out of seasons. I never watch it on tv, as I always miss loads of episodes and then forget to tape it, but I buy the complete seasons on dvd… But as I said; they’ve run out of new seasons for Grey’s Anatomy, so imagine the joy when I found this two days ago! Spin-off Private practice; the complete first season… Now I am sure there are many people out there who now think I am a lunatic. Quite frankly Tom always makes sure he is far away when I am about to watch one of the series, as I usually end up crying anyway. Haha, what is the fun in watching a series that makes you cry? I guess that cannot be explained. You either get it or you don’t. Period… I just watched the first episode (and yes, I cried!!) during my dinner. Gotta do some more work, but I will for sure watch another episode before the night is over!

And now over to the recipe:

400 gr pasta (any shape)

250 gr. frozen peas

125 gr ricotta

bacon

olive oil

mint (I used basil instead)

parmezan

Cook the pasta. In the meantime fry the bacon in another pan untill it turns golden. Add the peas and about 4 tablespoons of water. Bring to a boil untill the peas start to soften and the water is evaporated. Add the pasta and stir in the ricotta. If the pasta seems to dry add a bit of the cooking water of the pasta. Season to taste and scatter with basil leaves and parmezan shavings. And voila done!

Ricotta gnocchi

When reading about this challenge – the very first one for the daring cooks – I was a little anxious. The recipe seemed quite complicated plus I already know that my man would really not like this. He isn’t into anything that is cheesy and ricotta with parmezan…. well, that is just asking for trouble. But ok, making another pasta dish alongside wouldn’t be too complicated…!

My first goal was to find fresh ricotta. I did find it when I was in Italy the week before I made the recipe, but I didn’t want to risk putting that in my suitcase for fear of having a ricotta coated suitcase when I would arrive back home, so I left it there and searched for it in Holland. No luck. So I bought the regular packaged ricotta and as instructed put them in a drainer with paper towels and put it in the fridge overnight. To be honest I felt it was already quite dry and didn’t expect any fluid to come out, but it did! And much more then I had thought it would so I am glad I decided not to skip this step.

Preparing the batter was easy; adding eggs, butter, salt and parmezan and it looked all good and ready to go although I was wondering how I was supposed to make anything substantial out of batter like that.

Batter for ricotta gnocchi

I had watched the very helpful video of the Zuni cafe and it all looked relatively easy if you watched the video…. Ha… not so much!

The batter is so light that scooping some out of the bowl on a tablespoon and pushing it – gently – into the flour sounds easy but I found it quite difficult. Well, maybe difficult is not the right word, but it’s not easy to keep the sizes consistent. In the recipe they said to carefully pick up the gnocchi and make them into an oval ball of sorts, but I didn’t think that was feasible without making the shape more terrible then it already was…

Maybe the batter was slightly too light, but when I made my test gnocchi it stayed together perfectly and the tasty was light and fluffy, so I am not sure but it all seemed quite ok. However, looking at some of the other photos of the batter that people had, mine was waaaay too soft! Maybe it was still to wet, although not much more liquid was coming out of the ricotta. I guess I will have to make it again just to see how I can improve this. Unfortunately it always seems one of the things that doesn’t happen if Tom doesn’t like it… Although he will be gone for a few days in june, so that might be a time for me to experiment with better gnocchi!

Small blob in the flour

The sauce I prepared was simple yet tasty; I used a basic tomato sauce with zucchini, a bell pepper, garlic and some herbs I threw in topped with parmezan. It tasted good. Not spectaculair but good. It’s always hard to try and cook and shoot photos at the same time and I should have taken a photo of the kitchen afterwards as it looked like a flour explosion had taken place!

So what did I think of the recipe? I found it challenging and it was tasty, but I will have to try this again to see if I can improve on the softness of the batter to make it easier to handle. If you want to give this a try; here is the recipe!

Zuni Ricotta Gnocchi

Source: From The Zuni Café Cookbook.

Yield: Makes 40 to 48 gnocchi (serves 4 to 6)

Prep time: Step 1 will take 24 hours. Steps 2 through 4 will take approximately 1 hour.

Tips:

- If you can find it, use fresh ricotta. As Judy Rodgers advises in her recipe, there is no substitute for fresh ricotta. It may be a bit more expensive, but it’s worth it.
- Do not skip the draining step. Even if the fresh ricotta doesn’t look very wet, it is. Draining the ricotta will help your gnocchi tremendously.
- When shaping your gnocchi, resist the urge to over handle them. It’s okay if they look a bit wrinkled or if they’re not perfectly smooth.
- If you’re not freezing the gnocchi for later, cook them as soon as you can. If you let them sit around too long they may become a bit sticky.
- For the variations to the challenge recipe, please see the end of the recipe.

Equipment required:

- Sieve
- Cheesecloth or paper towels
- Large mixing bowl
- Rubber spatula
- Tablespoon
- Baking dish or baking sheet
- Wax or parchment paper
- Small pot
- Large skillet
- Large pan or pot (very wide in diameter and at least 2 inches deep)

Videos that might help:

- Judy Rodgers Gnocchi Demo
- Making fresh ricotta demo
- Making ricotta gnocchi

For the gnocchi:

1 pound (454 grams/16 ounces) fresh ricotta (2 cups)
2 large cold eggs, lightly beaten
1 tablespoon (1/2 ounce) unsalted butter
2 or 3 fresh sage leaves, or a few pinches of freshly grated nutmeg, or a few pinches of chopped lemon zest (all optional)
½ ounce Parmigiano-Reggiano, grated (about ¼ cup very lightly packed)
about ¼ teaspoon salt (a little more if using kosher salt)
all-purpose flour for forming the gnocchi

For the gnocchi sauce:

8 tablespoons (227 grams/1/4 pound/4 ounces) butter, sliced
2 teaspoons water

Step 1 (the day before you make the gnocchi): Preparing the ricotta.

If the ricotta is too wet, your gnocchi will not form properly. In her cookbook, Judy Rodgers recommends checking the ricotta’s wetness. To test the ricotta, take a teaspoon or so and place it on a paper towel. If you notice a very large ring of dampness forming around the ricotta after a minute or so, then the ricotta is too wet. To remove some of the moisture, line a sieve with cheesecloth or paper towels and place the ricotta in the sieve. Cover it and let it drain for at least 8 hours and up to 24 hours in the refrigerator. Alternatively, you can wrap the ricotta carefully in cheesecloth (2 layers) and suspend it in your refrigerator for 8 to 24 hours with a bowl underneath to catch the water that’s released. Either way, it’s recommended that you do this step the day before you plan on making the gnocchi.

Step 2 (the day you plan on eating the gnocchi): Making the gnocchi dough.

To make great gnocchi, the ricotta has to be fairly smooth. Place the drained ricotta in a large bowl and mash it as best as you can with a rubber spatula or a large spoon (it’s best to use a utensil with some flexibility here). As you mash the ricotta, if you noticed that you can still see curds, then press the ricotta through a strainer to smooth it out as much as possible.

Add the lightly beaten eggs to the mashed ricotta.

Melt the tablespoon of butter. As it melts, add in the sage if you’re using it. If not, just melt the butter and add it to the ricotta mixture.

Add in any flavouring that you’re using (i.e., nutmeg, lemon zest, etc.). If you’re not using any particular flavouring, that’s fine.

Add the Parmigiano-Reggiano and the salt.

Beat all the ingredients together very well. You should end up with a soft and fluffy batter with no streaks (everything should be mixed in very well).

Step 3: Forming the gnocchi.

Fill a small pot with water and bring to a boil. When it boils, salt the water generously and keep it at a simmer. You will use this water to test the first gnocchi that you make to ensure that it holds together and that your gnocchi batter isn’t too damp.

In a large, shallow baking dish or on a sheet pan, make a bed of all-purpose flour that’s ½ an inch deep.

With a spatula, scrape the ricotta mixture away from the sides of the bowl and form a large mass in the centre of your bowl.

Using a tablespoon, scoop up about 2 to 3 teaspoons of batter and then holding the spoon at an angle, use your finger tip to gently push the ball of dough from the spoon into the bed of flour.

At this point you can either shake the dish or pan gently to ensure that the flour covers the gnocchi or use your fingers to very gently dust the gnocchi with flour. Gently pick up the gnocchi and cradle it in your hand rolling it to form it in an oval as best as you can, at no point should you squeeze it. What you’re looking for is an oval lump of sorts that’s dusted in flour and plump.

Gently place your gnocchi in the simmering water. It will sink and then bob to the top. From the time that it bobs to the surface, you want to cook the gnocchi until it’s just firm. This could take 3 to 5 minutes.

If your gnocchi begins to fall apart, this means that the ricotta cheese was probably still too wet. You can remedy this by beating a teaspoon of egg white into your gnocchi batter. If your gnocchi batter was fluffy but the sample comes out heavy, add a teaspoon of beaten egg to the batter and beat that in. Test a second gnocchi to ensure success.

Form the rest of your gnocchi. You can put 4 to 6 gnocchi in the bed of flour at a time. But don’t overcrowd your bed of flour or you may damage your gnocchi as you coat them.

Have a sheet pan ready to rest the formed gnocchi on. Line the sheet pan with wax or parchment paper and dust it with flour.

You can cook the gnocchi right away, however, Judy Rodgers recommends storing them in the refrigerator for an hour prior to cooking to allow them to firm up.

Step 4: Cooking the gnocchi.

Have a large skillet ready to go. Place the butter and water for the sauce in the skillet and set aside.

In the largest pan or pot that you have (make sure it’s wide), bring at least 2 quarts of water to a boil (you can use as much as 3 quarts of water if your pot permits). You need a wide pot or pan so that your gnocchi won’t bump into each other and damage each other.

Once the water is boiling, salt it generously.

Drop the gnocchi into the water one by one. Once they float to the top, cook them for 3 to 5 minutes (as in the case with the test gnocchi).

When the gnocchi float to the top, you can start your sauce while you wait for them to finish cooking.

Place the skillet over medium heat and melt the butter. Swirl it gently a few times as it melts. As soon as it melts and is incorporated with the water, turn off the heat. Your gnocchi should be cooked by now.

With a slotted spoon, remove the gnocchi from the boiling water and gently drop into the butter sauce. Carefully roll in the sauce until coated. Serve immediately.

Variations: For the gnocchi, you can flavour them however you wish. If you want to experiment by adding something to your gnocchi (i.e., caramelized onion, sundried tomato), feel free to do so. However, be forewarned, ricotta gnocchi are delicate and may not take well to elaborate additions. For the sauce, this is your chance to go nuts. Enjoy yourselves. Surprise us!!!

Freezing the gnocchi: If you don’t want to cook your gnocchi right away or if you don’t want to cook all of them, you can make them and freeze them. Once they are formed and resting on the flour-dusted, lined tray, place them uncovered in the freezer. Leave them for several hours to freeze. Once frozen, place them in a plastic bag. Remove the air and seal the bag. Return to the freezer. To cook frozen gnocchi, remove them from the bag and place individually on a plate or on a tray. Place in the refrigerator to thaw completely. Cook as directed for fresh gnocchi.

Ricotta and white bean salad

I’ve been meaning to try out a few things by replicating an original photo. I’ve done this for the first time last year and was planning to do it every month, but work kind of got in the way of things. I then bumped into the SLW remake group on Flickr and thought I continue where I left of. The other day Christie of Coco Bean and me asked if I thought buying the Donna Hay magazine was worth it…. To which I can only reply with a wholeheartedly; YES! I think the photography is absolutely beautiful as is the styling. I actually took a subscription to this australian magazine and received my first copy last week! Soooo much quicker then trying to find it here in Holland as that is close to impossible. To give an example; I received issue 44 by mail last week and I managed to find issue 42 (the christmas issue) in the store the same week. Just out!!

I picked a recipe that was easy to make and what I could eat for lunch. The original recipe is from issue 42 (that is the christmas issue) and is featured on page 64. My main goal here was to duplicate the lighting and most of the styling. It’s one of the things that I admire about the photographers that are working with Donna Hay; there ability to control the light. This particular image is taken by Chris Court, one of my heroes, styling by Justine Poole. I am actually quite pleased with the end result although the colors of my background was a little more blueish and my bowl and fork are slightly different, but I think I managed to stay quite close to the original!

Donna Hay remake

The colors tend to come out wrong in my scan so believe me if I say that the colors are not too different from eachother! I wanted to light this scene with studioflash as I felt that would give me more control then daylight. I even remember to take a photo of my lighting setup, so here is how it looked in my studio.

Lighting setup for Donna Hay remake

The dish was eaten by the time I remember to take the shot, but the setup is the same. (minus the camera as that is what I had to use to take the photo… )I should have lit the scene from the right, but I only noticed that after I was finished so that was a mistake. I made my photo slightly lighter to more resemble the original photo.

In addition to the reflector of foamboard that you see in the photo I also used a bit of mirror to add a tiny bit more light inside the dish. I am quite pleased with the end results. I think it’s a truly great exercise as it forces you to really look at an image and try to define how it is lit. I will try and do this again as I feel it enhances my own skills ultimately by understanding the whole process (including the styling)

After having eaten the ricotta salad, which was delicious by the way; I continued on with styling and making a dish of my own, but I will post about that tomorrow…

Here is the recipe for the ricotta salad!

RICOTTA AND WHITE BEAN SALAD

1×400 gr can white (cannellini) beans, rinsed and drained

1 small red onion. thinly sliced

1/4 cup (30g) pitted black olives, halved

1/4 cup flat leaf parsley leaves

1-2 small red chillies, sliced

125 g cherry tomatoes, halved

sea salt and cracked black pepper

100 g fresh ricotta

2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

2 teaspoons red wine vinegar

Place the beans, onion, olives, parsley, chilli, tomato, salt and pepper in a bowl and toss gently to combine. Divide between serving plates and top with fresh ricotta. Combine the oil and vinegar and spoon over the salad to serve. Serves 2.

Ricotta salad

Roasted ricotta with honey tomatoes

Still not feeling all that well, although slightly better then yesterday. The thing now is that my eyes are completely puffed up from tearing so much yesterday, so it’s really not a pretty sight! Not a day to go outside… Anyone has an instant cure for puffy eyes (really, really puffy that is!) I would love to know! So I still had some ricotta in the fridge plus lovely honey tomatoes that I had bought previously and figured would make a great lunch together with the focaccia bread that was also leftover from friday’s Italian meal (still had to be baked).  So when I went downstairs to start preparing lunch I was greeted by a loudly screaming cat.

Gizmo demanding her medicine

We have three cats, all of which are very old. The youngest one, who was the one screaming, is called Gizmo and will be 17 years in may. The middle one is 19 and the eldest of the threesome is 21 years old. So it’s a bunch of ancient cats together.

Gizmo has a thyroid gland problem, so she needs to have one pill each day. In the beginning that was a total disaster. As any catowner knows, cats are rather smart and she knew quite soon that if she got something nice like chicken or tunasalad, there would be a bitter tasting thing inside. So she either ate around it, spit it out or did anything to prevent it going down where it was supposed to go. I am not sure at what point it changed, but we are now at the third set of 100-pill boxes, so she must have had around 250 pills by now (minus the ones she managed to spit out) and we have found the perfect mode. She actually reminds me that she hasn’t had her medicine yet, by very loudly screaming while sitting on the table near the fridge. She comes running when I shake the little pillbox even! The trick is that I hide the pill inside tunasalad (which she loves) and then balance the bit containing the pill on my finger. I first let her have some of the tuna from my left hand and then hold her the balancing but on the right finger. One lick of her tongue means the tuna almost “collapses” into her mouth and she has no other option but to swallow. Because it goes so fast, she has no time to eat around the pill as it goes down before she notices it. Plus I always make sure that there is something left on my finger and – little greedy monster that she is – she cannot resist that so swallows that too… Fingers crossed that it stays that way cause with cats you never know!

Ricotta roasted with tomatoes

Anyway, after having given her the medicine I popped the ricotta in the oven along with some lovely honey tomatoes that are very sweet especially after having roasted in the oven for about 20 minutes. I seasoned the tomatoes and the ricotta just with pepper and salt and added some fresh basil on top after removing it from the oven. I am slightly disappointed on the look of the ricotta as it still looks the same as when I took it out of the container. I would have hoped it started looking a little more appealing after coming from the oven but it didn’t. For next time I will probably season the ricotta inside as well, mix it up a little more and then roast, rather then doing it as I did now. Maybe adding some other herbs during the roasting process would also increase the flavor. Rosemary or oregano maybe?

On crusty bread! Delicious

It did taste very well and was certainly very filling. It’s hardly worth calling a recipe, but in case you want to try it:

Put ricotta out of it’s container in a baking tray with some tomatoes. Add any type you like, I used honey tomatoes as I love their sweet taste, especially once they are roasted. Did you know that tomatoes are actually one of the few vegetables that are actually higher in nutrients if you process them? I read it somewhere once… can’t remember why or where though.. haha… Anyway, just wanted to share that bit of information. Sprinkle both the tomatoes and the ricotta with some olive oil, add salt and pepper and pop in the oven for about 20 minutes. Spread it over a nice crusty bread such as I have done here with the focaccia or eat any other way you like.

Now… it was a bit too much for one person, so I had some leftovers and while cleaning up the kitchen it was still on the table… Gizmo decided she had earned a little of the ricotta as well!! I do have to confess that ever since she got that thyroid problem she is very spoilt by us. We try and maintain her weight which is hard with this particular illness, so she gets all sorts of treats to keep her at the same weight. And it is working too! Last time we were at the vet she was pleasantly surprised to find that she has not lost any weight since last time (she’s only about 3 kilo) which is quite good in this condition. So the spoiling helps… and that is why I let het eat a little so I could take a photo and then removed the plates and threw out the remainders…

Gizmo enjoying leftovers

If you don’t have cats or don’t like cats, you will probably find this all probably very disgusting, but if you do have cats I am sure you can relate!

I haven’t tasted the final results yet, as we are planning on having it for dinner along with some of the other dishes we made (yes and photographed, so more to come here!).

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