Chef Monsta: I cook, therefore I blog

Sheara here…Chef Monsta’s big sis…when I told her today that I planned on making gnocchi tonight, she said to me “Don’t bother making gnocchi from scratch, it takes forever, just buy it pre-made and make the sauce“. But, being that I had potatoes that I wanted to use up, and having never made gnocchi before, I ignored Chef Monsta and made it anyway. Here’s what I came up with:

First I put the potatoes on to boil, since they take at least 20 minutes to soften. I kept the peel on, because once cooked, the peels just slide right off. Side note, never put cold potatoes in already boiled water because the skin will crack; cover potatoes with water and bring to a boil together.

Once the potatoes were in, I started on my sauce. I sliced up a package of button mushrooms and sauteed them in about 3 tablespoons or so of butter. Let them get nice and brown, about 5-7 minutes.

Next comes the white wine (I had Pinot Grigio). One cup for the pan, one cup for me. Make that two cups for me. (Yes, I measured it out in my lovely new Sur La Tabla red measuring cup).

The one needs to reduce down to about half the amount, give or take another five minutes. After that, I added half and half (whole cream probably works better but I didn’t have).

While the shroom sauce was cooking down, the potatoes got soft enough, so I drained, peeled, and started mashing them up for the gnocchi.

Make sure you mash up the potatoes really well so there are no lumps – remember, this will be a dough. I added to the potatoes about a cup of flour (which I realized later was not nearly enough), an egg, a bunch of grated Parmesan, salt & pepper, some thyme (had it) and about half a tsp of nutmeg. It was lots of fun grating the whole nutmeg; I love the smell of fresh nutmeg (I keep my nutmeg in the freezer and they keep for a loooooong time).

The next step – and here’s the huge pain in my arse, which took a lot of time, used a lot of flour, and made a huge mess: knead the potato “dough”, roll them between your hands, and cut them up into bite size pieces.

Next, you gotta cook those little suckers in boiling water for a couple minutes – you will know they are done because they will float. And I promise you they WILL float (I was nervous that they would all stick together to the bottom of the pot, but alas).

And last but not least, I removed them from the water and added them to my mushroom sauce.

And an hour and half later….

They were very delicious, I have to say. Don’t let my sloppy gloopy presentation fool you; these came out very tasty and the gnocchi were surprisingly light.  However, the moral of the story kids: next time Chef Monsta tells you that cooking something is not worth the time, and to buy it pre-made, you LISTEN. Do not be stubborn like me. 1.5 hours cooking + .5 hours cleaning + 10 minutes eating = NOT WORTH IT.

Hence, my blog post, dear sister, so I don’t feel like I completely wasted my time tonight. Love you. All hail the great Chef Monsta.