EASY HOMEMADE GNOCCHI, with ANYTHING YOU LIKE

This is a recipe that once tried, you'll come back to over and over again.

1. It's SUPER EASY
2. It makes you feel like an Italian Domestic Goddess
3. It's SUPER CHEAP
4. It's versatile to the point you can pretty much stick anything you like over it. 
5. It's great to make with the kids. 

When Roo was weaning and we were very skint, I made a lot of gnocchi. That was about 9 years ago. We were mad for the stuff, and then I kind of just forgot about it. Well, in the interests of our budget saving, I returned to it last night - and honestly, I can't believe how easy it is and how silly I've been for not making it in several years. 

I had forgotten the simple joy of making dough, cutting it and then watching with child-like fascination as it pops to the top of the boiling water announcing to the world that it's cooked. 

I'm going to give you last night's recipe but at the end of it, I'm going to talk you through some fabulous alternatives. 

Last night I fried mine off in butter - because that is how I really love gnocchi, but very often you don't need to do the frying stage, especially if you're going to do sauce based bakes - more on that later. 

Gnocchi is so versatile, you can do a lot of
different things with it. Last night we had it
with wilted spinach and blue-cheese and
roast tomatoes. It was delicious with salad,
and very man-pleasing LOL. Jonathan
said it was his favourite dish of the week,
and there has been some stiff competition
this week. 

So many recipes and cooking books suggest that Quick and Easy is all people want. This has always frustrated me. There are some days that I actually want to take it SLOW and MINDFUL in the kitchen; when I'm not looking for a chuck it together kind of deal. I want dishes that I can chill out and cook with the kids whilst chattering about school, life and the universe. This is one of those dishes. 

It's a time to put on your pinny and the radio and lose yourself in the simple pleasures of turning basic ingredients into something special, just as if you were a magician. 

This dish will do ANY social occasion from after school children's dinners, to date night, to big family gatherings, to Sunday lunches. 

LEVEL: EASY

COST: £ (per portion, the gnocchi is about 40-50p a portion and then toppings vary) 

VEGETARIAN

TIME: About an 1 hour of lovely relaxing prep. 

INGREDIENTS  (Serves 6)

Basic Gnocchi recipe

1. 4-5 medium potatoes peeled, quartered and boiled until just soft. 
2. 90-100g of flour 
3. 1 egg

Pan Fried in Butter with wilted spinach, blue cheese and warm tomatoes. 

a couple of teaspoons of butter

1 bag of spinach or 2 large bunches from the market

1 palm size piece of blue cheese - gorgonzola or stilton or any other blue cheese

5-6 cherry tomatoes. 

METHOD. 

The dough should just hold
together like this. You'll
feel when it's right in
your hand. 

1. Rice or mash your boiled potatoes until they are fluffy and lump free (I always use a ricer) 
2. Scatter and fold in half the flour into the mashed potatoes 
3. Add the beaten egg and fold
4. Add the rest of the flour. and with your hands, begin to turn the dough over in the bowl. You want to keep the dough as soft as you can but so that it still holds together. You may need to had a small handful of extra flour if you're potatoes were a little bigger. 

NEXT 

They firm up whilst cooking
and go a little heavier and a
little slimy. 

1. Cut the dough into about 6 pieces and using your fingers on a floured board, make it into a small sausage / snake shape. Cutting it into small pieces a little wider than the width of a fork. 
2. In a large pan, bring water up to the boil and turn down to a gentle simmer. Plop your little soft dough balls into the hot water and watch as they sink to the bottom. After a minute or two, they will float to the surface and let you know they are ready. 



Cut them a little wider than
a fork and then press the
fork in - the idea is that
it will trap the sauce and
flavours, as well as making
it look pretty. 

3. Scoop from the surface and put on a plate. Repeat this process until you have used all your dough. 

NEXT - if you're not making a sauce-baked dish (see below for details) 

Fry until golden brown

1. In a frying pan, heat butter and oil until the butter starts to foam. Fry them off in batches (if you add too many, the residual water will make them sweat rather than fry golden brown.) Each batch takes a few minutes and they need a little care so as to keep them golden and not burned. 

2. In the same buttery pan, add your washed spinach and wilt it down. Spread out across the bottom of an oven proof dish and layer up the gnocchi around it, pulling out bits of spinach to make it look pretty. Add crumbled blue cheese and the tomatoes halved. 

3. Warm through in the oven for about 15 minutes. For the purposes of last night, I wanted to serve it with salad so didn't want it piping hot - just warmed, but leave it in for 20-25 if you want it really hot. 

TOP TIP: You can make these in big batches and then keep them in the fridge in a Tupperware box for 3-4 days, just heating them up when and as. 

OPTIONS & IDEAS

SPINACH AND PARMESAN

I split the gnocchi portions and fed the girls with the gnocchi, wilted spinach and parmesan - a drizzle of truffle oil is wonderful on top. 

BAKED TOMATO GNOCCHI

Stop at the boiling stage and place in a casserole dish / oven proof lasagne dish. Add pasta, basil leaves and mozzarella and bake for around 30-40 minutes. 

CREAMY CHICKEN GNOCCHI BAKE

Stop at the boiling stage and make a white cheddar cheese sauce. Add either fried or roasted chicken, asparagus or peas and / or blue cheese and pour over the gnocchi, baking for around 30-40 minutes 

PAN FRIED WITH HOT SMOKED SALMON & HORSERADISH CREAM

Pan fry the gnocchi, place on a warmed plate and flake over hot-smoked salmon or trout. 

3tbsp Mayonaise

1 tbsp Creme Fraiche

1 tsp (to taste) Horseradish

PAN FRIED WITH PRAWNS & SCANDI CREAM & DILL

Pan fry the gnocchi, place on a warmed plate. On the side place the Prawn and Scandi Cream & Dill mix

3tbsp of Mayonnaise

1 tbsp Creme Fraiche

About 2-3 tbsp of finely chopped dill

3 handfuls of small atlantic prawns. 

The options are endless and I look forward to reading some of your favourite combinations in the comments. 

The Very Early & Dramatic Effects of our 2018 Life Detox.

What we thought was going to be a really hard
change to make, what we thought was going to be
a month of iron will-power and sacrifice is turning
into one of the most positive months of
our lives. The decisions we are making are so
flipping obvious now we're actually living them.

We're now almost three weeks into our new family approach to living - call it a kind of detox if you want to be all hip and trendy. It's hard changing a lifetime of behaviours. It's hard breaking habits, and that's why having the eye on the prize at all times is important.

It's about rewards and it's about ambitions; it's also about acknowledging that the actions you took before had consequences - I guess it's about adulting LOL.

So where are we as a family 3 weeks on.

* Skin: 
okay, so after a very visible reaction to the change in our diet and most importantly alcohol reduction by 75-80% less alcohol, my skin has literally transformed. 3 weeks on and I'm positively glowing, which at 37 is a nice perk. My skin feels much more velvety, like the cover of a good book, the pores have reduced and it's definitely in better condition, I now just need the tiniest dab of moisturiser to look like I've a full face of makeup.

After last weeks spot outbreak taking me back to teenage angst, this is a welcome relief. I had four great big zits (there's seriously no other word for them) across my neck / jawline - something I have never had before. Not only were they painful, but they we a weird distraction. This also happened across my shoulders. Obviously in the age of google, I looked this up in terms of alcohol reduction and yep, there, clear as day, this was my body detoxing. It was that visible. It was that causal. That was the crap pushing out of my body.

* Energy & Mental Health: 
You really aren't going to like this but yes, I have WAAAAAY more energy. Eating lighter, smaller and better balanced portion sizes before bed, and not drinking half a bottle of wine +  means I'm getting far better sleep quality. I've not had an attack of insomnia in almost twenty nights. My temperature fluctuations at night are settling down.

I'm finding the morning and the school run a LOT less of a struggle, to the point I'm almost sociable when in the first hour I wake up (and trust me, my family have learned over the years to let a sleeping bear lie when it comes to mum and bed)

I am SOOOO much more productive as a result.

The house is more organised, better kept. I've tackled jobs that seemed sometimes overwhelming and all of this is leading to a much better state of mental health and reduced stress responses. Our evenings have suddenly become viable time to do something other than sit on the sofa and drink wine. We're better as a couple at tidying before bed and this feels like some of the mum working from home burden is being considerably lifted.

As a result of the house being better organised and more efficient, I'm getting more time to actually do my work. I could never settle to write in a messy house and that ate into my time and motivation.

*Weight Loss: 
I'm going to reiterate that this is not a weight loss project, but it is a welcome side effect and upholds my belief that if you get life in the right balance, then weight is naturally maintained at a healthy level.

I'm guessing there are two factors that are causing my rings to finally spin around and my watch to slink up and down, and my jeans to need pulling up (I haven't weighed myself as I don't want that to become a focus and then I lose track of the real objective)

1)  the thousands of less calories we are not consuming through alcohol / wine -- but this is important; we're not replacing our evening drinking with replacements; mostly because all of those we've tried are crap. We've gone to drinking a cup of tea / green or black and that being enough. Dinner is Cranberry and tonic, a single glass, which is the only bearable soft drink.

2) generally more energy meaning that the metabolism is kicking in and burning off calories.

*Money:
We have saved hundreds of pounds in the first three weeks, which after Christmas has knocked some of the deficit that Christmas brings about. We are well on target to meet our 10k savings this year.

*Children & Values: 
Our children lead a very privileged life, I'm not going to deny it. Our philosophy has always been that as long as they are kind, compassionate, empathetic and not spoilt dicks, then they could pretty much have what they wanted when it came to books, stationary, magazines, day trips, fossils, fillet steak and lobster (trust me, our eldest is one of those) etc etc -

We reflected that although our kids seriously rock - and I mean they do. They care deeply about the planet and the vulnerable of the world (almost to the point it weighs too heavy on our 10 year old empath's mind) we also had to acknowledge that our kids were losing sight of the value of money.

International travel, tasting menus, patisseries from the Savoy, theatre trips etc were all becoming part of their 'norm' which is kind of what we wanted, but at the same time, there has to be a true appreciation of how many hours of the day job goes into paying a restaurant bill of a few hundred pounds, of how many books sold it takes to upgrade to business class on the plane - and how CHOICES have to be made to spread money out as best we can to maximise the experiences we have, pay the bills without worry, and to stash away for the future.

Never is this more apparent than in the super market and the 'Can we get' mantra that seems to pour out of a lot of children's mouths. The solution to this has been the lists, which also have the pre-checked prices next to items. The power  of being able to say 'It's not on the list' was immense, it was like Wonder Woman's arm shield.

I must have said 'It's not on the list' about 20 times on our last supermarket trip - and do you know what, there wasn't a SINGLE challenge about that. Not a single comeback, just a sort of huffy acceptance - and you should have seen their face when I said they could get an 80p treat of creme caramel pots that wasn't on the list. I don't think I've seen such appreciation for anything from either of them in a long time.

*Planet & waste
I can sense that previous habits are being broken and new ones are being established. The food waste bin was full this week and although we didn't quite make our waste target of 1 black bag last week, we have two days to go and we have only filled one black bag of rubbish in our kitchen. This is an insane difference. We were usually around 4 black bin bags and two recycling boxes a week.

This week we are looking at 4 recycling boxes + a full food recycling bin and just one black bag of landfill rubbish.

Two huge cotton shoppers were filled with veg from the green grocers, significantly reducing the amount of packaging we normally have from vegetables from the supermarket.

We had begun to make the change to cotton bags about 3 years ago but have been a bit haphazard, often forgetting them. But we have used no plastic carrier bags in 2 weeks - that's about 6 less plastic carrier bags floating around the ocean, landfill. I've got into the habit of a foldaway in my pocket and visiting the supermarket only once or getting home delivery has made a big difference.

There have been no straws or coffee cups in three weeks either. It's the small things that add up. I think that that action alone has reduced our plastic / cup consumption by one standard carrier bag full of waste - over a year, that's significant.

It's three weeks in, not long enough to become habit changing / breaking behaviour yet. But let's put it this way, Feb is coming and Dry January is becoming just Dry and the things we are putting in place are becoming sustainable and part of our routine.


Here's to better health, better bank balances and a better planet.

CHUNKY BEANY BIG SOUP

This week's menu plans are a little all over the place but we're still on track if not a little re-ordered and adapted. Tonight was meant to be Vegetable Green Thai Curry but Jonathan is at the dentist having work done so asked if we could have something a little softer and easier to eat.

Being as I hadn't made the Borlotti Bean soup for lunches (as I've been under a crazy writing deadline and haven't stopped for lunch) I decided to make it tonight for our supper.

The girls had leftovers, being that we unexpectedly had them. One had the courgette penne and the other had the Italian Cottage pie from yesterday - which is where your stock of tupperwear comes in really handy.

LEVEL: EASY
COST: £ (approx £3.50)
VEGETARIAN & VEGAN
TIME: 20 Mins.

INGREDIENTS: Serves 6.
Olive Oil
1 medium onion
Half a courgette grated
2 x garlic cloves
1 x Tinned tomatoes
1 x tin of Borlotti Beans
1 x tin of Kidney Beans
1 small red chilli
2 x vegetable stock cubes
Blanched finely cut Kale or dark green cabbage.
tbsp Paprika
tsp Cayenne Pepper
Salt & Pepper to Season
OPTIONAL: Parmesan cheese to garnish

METHOD:

• Sweat the onions and garlic off, add the courgette. 
• Add the tinned tomatoes and fill the tin 3 x with hot water, stirring in the stock cubes. 
• Add the Borlotti Beans, the Kidney beans and 1/4 -1/2 of a red chilli thinly sliced. 
• Cook for around 15-20 minutes until all softened down and thickened a little. 
• Using a hand blender, pulse the mixture down so that it breaks the beans down a little but keeps some of the texture (you don't want it smooth) 
• Add Paprika and Cayenne and cook for a further 5 minutes (tasting and adding more heat to suit your palate.) 
• Add 3 handfuls of blanched green Kale / collards / spring cabbage.
• Serve with a generous handful of grated parmesan (unless Vegan) 

This is a soup that is even better if it's left to sit for a few hours / overnight to really secure the flavours.