It is true: gnocchi alla Romana are a delicious comfort food. Warm, creamy, decadent, yet simple and traditional, they originate from the region of Lazio, as their name betrays, but they are today popular across the country. They are special, because they are called gnocchi, but they have nothing in common with the famous potato dumplings everyone knows, as there are no potatoes nor flour in sight here.
As it often is the case with our most traditional dishes, mystery enshrouds their origins, to the point that, in truth, no one really knows when and where they were created. And the fact they use butter and parmigiano — two ingredients more typical of northern cuisine than Lazio’s — made many believe they had in fact originated somewhere near the Alps, like Piedmont.
It was, eventually, the great Pellegrino Artusitodispel all doubts when, in his seminal culinary work La Scienza in Cucina e l’Arte di Mangiar Bene, he definedgnocchi alla Romana one of the sette piatti dichiaratamente romani, that is, one of the seven dishes he called “overtly Roman.” If Artusi’s words weren’t enough, those of another food expert, Ada Boni, came to help: in her La Cucina Romana, whose aim was, in fact, that of preserving and passing on the capital’s own culinary traditions, she explained how gnocchi alla Romana are the last vestige of a Roman way of life that no longer exists. She wrote: “milk gnocchi alla Romana used to be, a long time ago, a common dish that good Romans would make every time there was something to celebrate. In particular, they would triumph at christening banquets or at Carnevale dinners.”
In spite of their unknown origins, then, gnocchi alla Romana are a staple of the Eternal City’s food tradition. But they are so delicious you’ll find them everywhere in Italy: indeed, they are a popular “rosticceria” dish, one you can buy and bring home, heat up in the oven and just enjoy. While in Rome Thursday is notably the day of gnocchi, in my family, up in Piedmont, they were more of a Sunday dish. Either way, they are comforting, filling, good for your belly. And good for your soul, too.
Ingredients (4 people)
- 1 liter (4 cups) of milk
- 1 1/2 cup of semolina
- 1/2 cup of butter
- 2/3 cup grated parmigiano or grana
- 2 egg yolks
- nutmeg (to taste)
- salt (to taste)
Instructions
- Bring the milk to the boil, adding 1 1/2 tbsps of butter and a pinch of salt to it. Once the mixture boils, pour the semolina “a pioggia,” that is, sparingly, little by little and over the whole surface of the liquid (this helps avoid lumps to form). Stir with a whisker until the mixture begins to thicken, then switch to a spoon. Cook for about 15 minutes, then turn the heat off and add a tad of nutmeg, a tbsp of grated parmigiano or grana and the two egg yolks.
- Pour the mixture on a tray (or large plate, or large oven dish: what you need is something flat and relatively big), ensuring you wet its surface lightly with water first. With a spatula or a rolling pin, spread the mixture evenly, so that it reaches a thickness of about 1/2 inch (1.5 to 2 cm). Let it all cool completely. If you want, you can do so in the fridge.
- Now, the fun part begins: cutting the gnocchi! You can use either a round cookie cutter or a glass, of about 1.5/2 in diameter (Personal note: my own grandmother, whose gnocchi alla Romana were just to-die-for, used to cut them into small squares of about 1/2 inch).
- Once they’ve been cut, place them in layers into a previously buttered oven dish. You have to be careful here and avoid laying them flat: your first row of gnocchi should be propped against the side of the oven dish, and the other placed at an angle against them, pretty much the way you do when you make scalloped potatoes.
- Take your grated cheese and sprinkle it all over the gnocchi.
- In a saucepan, melt the butter. Once that’s done, pour it all over the gnocchi and bake at 390F (200C) until they are gold and crunchy on top (that should take about 30 minutes, but keep an eye on them to be on the safe side)
- Let them cool slightly and serve! If you like, you can serve them with some sage leaves, too, to add some extra depth to the dish.
Extra tips
The people at Italy’s iconic publication La Cucina Italiana give us some extra tips to get an even nicer dish: for instance, they suggest to use the leftover bits from cutting the gnocchi (unless you decide to do the way my grandma did, which means you won’t have any!) to create a uniform layer at the bottom of the baking dish.
Another interesting tip relates to the making of the gnocchi themselves: instead of flattening the semolina mixture on a tray and using a cookie cutter to get the gnocchi, you could also divide the mixture in three or four, then pour it on large enough piece of parchment paper and roll it to create uniform cylinders. Put them in the fridge for about 20 minutes so that they solidify a little, then slice them and voilà, the gnocchi are ready!
Donate