Gnocchi. Oh yeah, that's good stuff. One of my all-time favorite meals, in fact. I remember the first time I ordered it, though. I was hesitant to try this"potato pasta". Sounded more like a Polish dish than a homey Italian plate if you asked me. A potato, I thought, should remain in its awesome potato forms. You know, roasted with rosemary, mashed with butter, fried with ketchup. But I decided to give it a shot.
But when my bowl of gnocchi arrived, I was even more disappointed; turned off by its bland white appearance and quite frankly, the small portion. Just a few little dough balls sitting atop a few wilted leaves of spinach.
So with low expectations, I smothered a bit of smashed, roasted garlic on my fork and begun a journey I would surely forget.
But a funny thing happened. Once that little potato pillow hit my mouth I was hooked. The firm, ever-so-slightly browned outside, the feathery inside, the buttery herb sauce. The spinach wasn't half bad either, though let's be honest, it needed more garlic. The portion size also proved to be perfect (by the way, that's a rare phrase to exit my mouth). I was an instant gnocchi lover.
The first time I made my own gnocchi, it looked like a flour plant exploded in my kitchen... and subsequently my living room. It's not a recipe for the faint of heart. Heidi at 101 Cookbooks even told me so. But if you like scrubbing dried potato dough out of your dishwasher vent, which apparently I do, then go ahead and try it for yourself. 
I don't know why I thought the second time would be different. Or why a yam gnocchi recipe (which calls for MORE flour than regular potato because of the yams' lower starch content) would be different. It wasn't. But the result was. The yams are much more difficult to work with, but the end product is a deliciously sweet, beautifully orange little potato pillow (atop an extra garlicky bed of wilted spinach).
Adding the sauteed onion into the dough added so much depth to the flavor. Though if you aren't keen on bits of onion ruining your pillowy experience, you can just include the onions in the sauce. My husband couldn't get enough of this meal; said it was the best meal I'd ever made! And we actually weren't married at the time he ate this meal so it was quite possibly the reason he showed up on our wedding day :)
Buon Appetito!
2 tbsp butter
2 egg yolks
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup grated parmessan cheese
1/2 onion, minced and sauteed onions (I used red onion and loved the sharp flavor with the sweet yams)
salt and pepper
Brown Butter Sauce:
3 tbsp butter
1/2 cup grated parmessan cheese
1 clove garlic
1 bunch fresh sage
1 sprig fresh rosemary
1. Peel and slice the yams.2. Steam until tender and mash them right away, making sure they are no lumps. This will require you getting in there with your fingers to smooth out some of the lumps.
3. Add the butter to the hot puree, then salt and pepper. Then incorporate the egg yolks, whisking fast so as not to scramble the eggs.
4. Add the grated parmessan and the onion and
5. Mix well to incorporate all the ingredients. Then flour your hands, add the flour slowly, and mix gently with your hands until you get a tender dough. Let the dough rest for a while. Do not overdo the kneading so the gluten doesn't develop
6. Separate the dough in smaller balls and roll them into snake-like cylinders. Keep flour nearby for your hands so the dough doesn't stick to your hands. You will get messy!7. Cut the cylinder into your desired gnocchi size. Use a sharp knife or a kitchen scraper (scooper?) and cut with purpose so that the gnocchi separates easily. Flour the plate or cutting board so that they do not stick to the surface. Do not stack the gnocchi on top of one another.
8. Roll the back side of a fork over each gnocchi; this will help the little guys catch the sauce.9. Bring a large pot of water to a rolling boil, salt the water, and drop the gnocchi in. You'll know when they're done because they will rise to the surface. Remove them from the water with a slotted spoon.
For the sauce:
1. Melt the butter in a skillet
2. Add the chopped garlic clove, sage, and rosemary. Let everything cook for a while, but make sure the butter doesn't burn.
*Tip: to prevent the butter from burning as easily, you can replace half the butter with olive oil, which will rise the burning temperature of the butter.
3. Add the gnocchi to the butter sauce and mix everything for one minute.4. Serve it quickly with the grated parmessan sprinkled on top.
