All I’m saying, is that I hear about ten different pronunciations of it every time it comes up in conversation. Which, strangely, doesn’t happen often. I wonder why that is? Well, around these parts, it’s because the husband dislikes gnocchi immensely. I conveniently forgot that he disliked it when I made this dish. But, beggars can’t be choosers and all that; it’s not like he was going to get up and cook something.
Anyhoodle. [I'll have you know that I just stopped and stared at the screen and tried to decide a) if it's douchey to say anyhoodle, and b) if I cared enough to change it, and realized c) It is and I don't, but I do apparently feel the need to explain my every thought process to you.]
I like gnocchi well enough, but it’s one of those things that I rarely ever think about eating because there are so many other things I like better [see: onions, caramelized; eggs, poached; etc., etc.]. But I saw a package of the vacuum packed gnocchi when I was in Trader Joe’s last week and decided to give it a shot. In my head, I wanted to pan fry them in some pancetta fat and hope for the best. So when we were trying to figure out what to have for the lunch the other day, I decided to give it a shot.
I got the gnocchi cooking in a big pot of salted water, then cooked some diced pancetta in another pan. Once the pancetta was done, I removed from the pan to crisp up, and left the fat in the pan. In another pan, with equal parts butter and olive oil (about a teaspoon each), I started cooking some diced onions, carrots, and garlic.
Once the gnocchi were done, I put them in the pan with the reserved pancetta fat along with some red pepper flakes, and let them crisp up on the outside and get all golden brown. Meanwhile, the onions were starting to just caramelize and the carrots were tender with still a little bite in them, so they were perfect. I added those to the pan with the gnocchi, added back in the pancetta to get it back up to temperature, and seasoned with salt and pepper. Then all of that went into a bowl with some fresh grated parmesan cheese.
I liked this; I thought the sweetness of the onions and carrots worked well with the saltiness of the pancetta and the cheese, the pepper added some welcome heat, and the gnocchi having more texture and bite made it more appealing to me. The husband . . . not so much. He liked everything but the gnocchi. He’s so silly.
But before we get to the goods, let’s have a Food Shenanigans moment of cooking safety. You see this plate? This is what happens when you put a styrofoam plate on a still hot burner. You probably shouldn’t do that. And if you do unthinkingly follow my poor example, you might want to hide it in the trash better than I did, so that maybe your husband [or wife] won’t find it. Of course, the burnt bits of styrofoam on the stove probably would have given me away eventually.
Also, another indicator that the dinner came out really well? It’s husband approved! [He's eating noodles that I made for him along with everything else that are not posted because they're from a boxed mix.] Aww, isn’t he precious?
