Real Gnocchi!

While my beautiful stand mixer has helped me conquer herb gnocchi, I had never attempted to make authentic, Italian gnocchi. The blizzard provided the perfect opportunity for what I expected to be a long and labor intensive project that actually turned out to be pretty easy. I was inspired by the following Bon Appetit recipe:

http://www.bonappetit.com/recipes/2010/02/potato_gnocchi_with_pork_and_wild_mushroom_ragu

I made only a few changes. First, I do not own a potato ricer or food mill so I used a fork to mash up the potatoes. I'm sure that the ricer would be ideal but the important thing is to keep the potatoes fluffy.
I also did not use prosciutto in mine because whole foods was all out of it! The ragu was amazing even without it but prosciutto makes everything better. If you don't want to tackle the gnocchi, this sauce would be great on almost any pasta or polenta.

Here are some pics of the process:

fluffing the potatoes



















ready for boiling!



















Yummy!



















The after picture...I should have gotten bread to soak up the sauce