Sweet Potato Gnocchi with Garlic Alfredo

We got sweet potatoes in our last CSA box & I decided I wanted to substitute sweet potatoes for regular potatoes in gnocchi. I thought I was being really novel until I saw all the recipes for this online & then Giada cooked it last week on Everyday Italian.  

There are a couple different versions of gnocchi recipes out there, either those that use egg or those that use ricotta cheese. I decided to use ricotta because I read it made for a light gnocchi. I ended up going with the Giada recipe except I used nutmeg instead of cinnamon. The dough was a lot stickier than I thought it would be & I ended up adding almost twice as much flour as the recipe called for & it was still sticky. I really needed to have a lot of flour on my work surface to roll the gnocchi out as well. You are supposed to roll the gnocchi over fork tines but they were just too soft to do that so I just kept the pillow shape.

We had planned on doing these with brown butter & sage but I had baked with brown butter earlier in the day & we had had enough of it for one day. So, Matt decided to make a garlic alfredo sauce. We thought its mellow creaminess would suit the sweetness of the gnocchi well.

We liked this dish quite a bit. I really wanted to love it but I think the sweet potato flavor didn't come through as much as I had hoped. The gnocchi was nice & light, I was afraid with the extra flour it might not be. I think we might try making this gnocchi again & serve it with the brown butter to see if you taste the sweet potato more.

Sweet Potato Gnocchi

recipe from Giada de Laurentiis

1 lb sweet potato

1/3 c ricotta cheese

3/4 t salt

1/4 t grated nutmeg

pinch of pepper

3/4 c all-purpose flour (or more as needed) plus more for work surface

Preheat the oven to 400 F. Poke a few holes in the sweet potatoes & place in the oven. Cook for 40 - 50 minutes until soft. Remove from oven & let cool. 

Remove the skins from the cooled potatoes & mash them, you should have about 1 cup of sweet potato. Stir the ricotta, salt, nutmeg & pepper into the mashed potatoes. Add the flour 1/4 cup at a time until you have a soft dough.

Flour your work surface. Using about 1/3 of the dough at a time roll it out to a 1-inch wide rope. Use a sharp knife to cut the rope into 1-inch pieces. 

Bring a large pot of water to a boil, salt & add 1/2 of the gnocchi. Boil for 5 - 6 minutes. Remove the cooked gnocchi with a strainer & cover to keep warm while you cook the second half.

Serves 2

Garlic Alfredo

2 T unsalted butter

1 clove garlic, minced

1/2 c cream

1/2 c grated parmesan

salt & pepper

Melt the butter over medium-low heat. Add garlic & cook a few minutes. Whisk in the cream. Add the cheese a little at time, whisking to melt. Salt & pepper to taste.

serves 2