Gnocchi with morels

Homemade Italian potato dumplings with dried morel mushrooms in a creamy Parmesan sauce- divine

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John Torode

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Recipe by John Torode

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Difficulty and servings

Serves 6

Ingredients

• 900g floury potatoes , peeled and cut into chunks
• 250g plain flour
• 30g dried morels
• olive oil
• butter
• 1 shallot , diced
• 2 garlic cloves , crushed
• 200g chestnut mushrooms , roughly chopped
• a handful flat-leaf parsley , chopped
• 100g Parmesan , grated
• 200g crème fraîche

1. 
   To make the gnocchi, boil the potatoes in as little water as possible until just tender. Drain very thoroughly, and put back in the pan over a low heat for a few minutes to dry out any moisture.
2. Mash the potatoes while they are still warm (they must be warm for this to work). Season, then slowly add the flour, kneading gently by folding the edges of the dough into the centre and pressing down lightly before sprinkling in each further addition of flour, until it is soft and 'duvet-like'. Don't overwork it or you will spoil the structure of the dough and end up with gnocchi that is powdery on the outside and pulpy on the inside.
3. Take little balls of the dough, and roll into long sausages about 2cm in diameter. Then cut each of these into 3cm pieces. Press each piece of dough against the back of a fork, so that it curves slightly and the prongs leave indentations which will help the gnocchi hold its accompanying sauce.
4. To make the sauce soak all but 2 of the morels in boiling water to rehydrate. Whizz the left-over dried morels, in a spice grinder, to powder. Heat 1 tbsp olive oil and a large knob of butter in a pan. Cook the shallots and the garlic until just softened. Add the chestnut mushrooms and cook until soft then add the soaked morels. Cook until heated through.
5. Cook the gnocchi in plenty of lightly salted simmering water for 3-4 minutes. The gnocchi are done 2 minutes after they rise to the surface.
6. In a clean pan, heat some more olive oil and butter and add the gnocchi and the mushroom mix. Toss well, add the parsley, parmesan and crème fraîche and toss again. Season with the morel powder to finish.

PER SERVING

516 kcalories, protein 15.2g, carbohydrate 58.3g, fat 24.5 g, saturated fat 13.8g, fibre 4g, salt 0.4 g