table talk / By Simona Carini

Potato Gnocchi

“The district is called Bengodi … and on a mountain, all of grated Parmigiano cheese, dwell folk that do naught else but make maccheroni and raviuoli, and boil them in capon’s broth, and then throw them down to be scrambled for.”

(April 26, 2007)  “The district is called Bengodi … and on a mountain, all of grated Parmigiano cheese, dwell folk that do naught else but make maccheroni and raviuoli, and boil them in capon’s broth, and then throw them down to be scrambled for.”

With the term “maccheroni,” Giovanni Boccaccio (1313-1375) described something similar to what we call gnocchi. It was probably the first type of pasta ever made: a mixture of flour and water (the flour from wheat, millet, farro) shaped into round dumplings that were then cooked in boiling water. The best-known version, made with potatoes, is fairly recent in historical terms, since potatoes did not become common in Italy until the 1800s. Unlike corn, whose cultivation spread rapidly after the initial introduction from the New World, potatoes were long viewed with diffidence and disdain. In time, however, the good qualities of the tuber, both in terms of nutrition and adaptability to different terrains, asserted themselves and the potato was enthusiastically embraced. What better proof of this wholehearted adoption than the induction of potatoes into the gnocchi tradition?

Gnocchi made with other main ingredients are still common in Italy. The small Sardinian malloreddusis made with semolina flour. Other gnocchi that are not flour-based are also common, like knödel, made with stale bread, and gnocchi di ricotta.

The strange-sounding word gnocchi traces its origin to the Latin term nucleus, from which nocchio, meaning gnarl,derived. In the dialect of the region around Venice nocchiobecame gnoco and from there it was an easy transition to gnocco and its plural gnocchi. I find it interesting that in ‘gnarl’ we find the same combination of consonants, gn, in which English speakers muted the g.

Potatognocchi are one of my mother’s specialties. I have memories of our family doctor, Ivo, having lunch with us whenever my mother made the dish. My father had known Ivo since he was a child, so he was on particularly familiar terms with my family. When my brother or I were sick, he would visit us at home in the evening to diagnose our illness of the day. Tall and gentle, he was a reassuring figure in our life, even though his prescriptions were often less than delectable. Like so many things I grew up with, I took both our doctor and potato gnocchi for granted. Nowadays home visiting family doctors are dismissed as time-inefficient and gnocchi are discounted as too time-intensive. I believe we should reevaluate our relationship with time, and devoting a couple of hours to make and cook gnocchi might be a good starting point.

When I decided to prepare gnocchi at home in California, I wondered about the wisdom of asking my mother for her recipe, given the useless struggle I engaged in when I tried to get her recipe for polenta (“Talk of the Table,” March 1). I decided to make an attempt anyway, and my mother left me speechless:

“One kilo of potatoes and 200 grams of flour.”

Was I hearing this right? Had my mother actually used exact quantities and units of measure? Before I was able to recover from my stunned state, my mother started her usual list of don’ts: don’t use eggs, don’t use watery potatoes, and more. I let her finish her litany without trying to stop her, even though I had a clear memory of how to make gnocchi from observing her. I was never allowed to touch anything due to an early diagnosis of utter ineptitude, which fortunately turned out to be perfectly curable.

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