Cooking with children - Gnocchi

Rush hour. Bath time. Dinner time. The kids want your attention. They are running and screaming all around the house, while you are in the kitchen putting sugar in your stew instead of salt and feeling the nerves on the edge of your fingers. Relax. I have an idea. Tight on your apron strings and put your kids to work!

I don't do this very often, but whenever I decide to cook gnocchi (Italian little potato dumplings), I ask F. to help me out. He's been doing them with me since he was 3 and he's getting really good at it.

They are very easy to do and here's how.

For 4 servings:

Ingredients:

• 4 large potatoes (or the equivalent to 1kg) 
• 2 cups of flour
• ½ cup of grated parmesan
• 1 egg
• 2 Tbsp of butter at room temperature
• Salt

Preparation:

1. Peel the potatoes and boil them in salty water. Cook until tender.
2. Meanwhile, in a small bowl, mix together the parmesan cheese, the egg and the butter. Reserve.
3. Once the potatoes are fully cooked (a knife should go through easily), while still warm, mash them with a fork, a potatoe masher or a food mill.
4. Combine to the mashed potatoes the mixture you had prepared earlier.
5. Start to add, little by little, the flour, kneading gently until forming a firm but still slightly sticky ball.
6. Dust your work surface with flour and start dividing the dought into little balls that you will then shape into rolls, like "snakes" and, finally, cut them into little dumplings or gnocchi. While doing this, dust your hands and work surface repeatedly with flour.
7. Cook the gnocchi in boiling and lightly salty water until they start floating to the surface. Using a strainer spoon, drain the gnocchi and put them in the serving bowl. Mix with the sauce and serve immediately.
8. Gnocchi go well with many sauces. Personnally, I like to serve them with a simple tomato sauce. Other suggestions could be a bolognese sauce, pesto sauce or even just melted butter with some sage (burro e salvia sauce).

Little "snakes" ready to be cut

Et voilà!